The administrators of each district choose topics for each edition. This year Porchia took her group of journalists to the World Ag Expo in Feb. “They have to prepare in advance and take little notebooks with them and wear their press badges and they were the reporters,” Porchia said. “They’re gonna interview somebody, so they have to practice interviewing before that day.”
Articles in this year’s first published issue, from Porchia’s class, highlighted several innovative new products as well as interviews with vendors from the expo. The publication included information on the Wheel Burro, a robotic harvest transport, Dual Chamber Cow Waterbeds and cow magnates.
The Migrant Journalism Project was created as an English language development tool for children of migrant families. The idea is through the process of interviewing people, migrant students gain confidence in their abilities to research, speak, write and communicate their stories.
Porchia said she can see many levels of improvement in her students from day one, to the culminating event. She said it can be complicated because each student is at a different level, but she sees improvements ranging from writing in complete sentences to being able to read what they have written and even how they speak.
