DigitaLENS: a community partnership with The Visual Media workshop, The Surrey School District, Princess Margaret Secondary School and Kwantlen Polytechnic University with generous funding by Telus. DigitalLENS Club: Digital Literacy Education for Novice Storytellers Digital Stories of Surrey Youth to Challenge Media Discourses on Youth Life in Surrey Mass media images of youth life in Surrey are stereotypical where everyday life is reduced to gang violence, youth victimization, and cultural and religious conflicts. What images of everyday life would we see if Surrey youth could control the cameras and tell the stories themselves? DigitaLENS brings together digital storytelling instructors and mentors with a group of grade 8-12 Surrey high school students. DigitaLENS instructs these students in digital storytelling techniques so that young people can tell their stories—the real stories—that challenge the negative mass media images of youth life in Surrey. These digital stories will be showcased on the Visual Media Workshop website, and tonight at the first KPU DigitaLENS Film Festival. What is Digital Storytelling? Digital Storytelling is the creation of short movies (2-5 minutes typically) incorporating photographs, video, animation, sound, text, and often the narrative voice of the person who makes the video. There are many different goals of digital stories: to tell a personal narrative or life experience, describe a life event or trip, or narrate a story for a particular cause (often related to social justice). Our students have produced digital stories related to social justice in the following themes: Narrative & Identity, Community & Care and Passion & Talent.
