Summer Programs of the Simpson Street Free Press

In addition to the operation of our student newspaper, the Simpson Street Free Press runs two summer programs:

Elementary School Summer Writing Workshops

The Simpson Street Free Press offers summer academic skills workshops for elementary and middle school students. Academic skills gained during the regular school year often slip during the summer months. Students who participate in our workshop series are immersed in positive learning activities throughout the summer. As always, we focus our efforts in core subject areas emphasizing writing, reading, and using computers. Students acquire critical academic and organizational skills that will serve them well for years to come. Two special issues of the Simpson Street Free Press are produced using articles written during the workshops.

The teen staff members of the Simpson Street Free Press are role models in the truest sense of the term. Minority achievement gap? Not at the Simpson Street Free Press. Many of our current and former high school students serve each summer as assistant teachers and mentors for the students in the workshop program. We rely heavily on our teen editors and senior staff writers for this project, as we do for all projects at the Simpson Street Free Press. They choose topics and article sources and edit the writing assignments of workshop participants. Essentially, these skilled and motivated high school and college students work to pass on to young workshop participants the knowledge they have gained in their own newsroom.

Summer Media Institute

During the Summer Media Institute, students serve internships at local newspapers and radio and television stations. The program combines these internships with classroom work and in-depth writing assignments. Many students see their work published in The Capital Times, Isthmus, and Wisconsin State Journal. Other students help produce news broadcasts. Some are paired with beat reporters covering various topics for local newspapers and television stations. Other students appear live on local radio programs. Internships emphasize hands-on, career-related job duties for high school students considering careers in media or journalism. The program’s goal is to foster young journalists who are interested in pursuing media-related careers. An advisory panel of local journalists assists in facilitating this important and innovative local program.

Simpson Street Free Press Special Feature Series

The Simpson Street Free Press continues to expand our popular Wisconsin Museum Series. Our students research and write about Wisconsin’s cultural heritage. Our state’s cultural heritage is a mosaic—full of rich ethnic themes waiting to be discovered by young people. Our young reporters research the history, culture, and ethnic heritage of Wisconsin through the remarkable world of museums. They investigate first-hand the locations they select, always with an eye on cultural themes, and always considering the interests of young readers. Then, readers of the Simpson Street Free Press embark on explorations of their own. Young readers will experience the art and history of Wisconsin through this professionally produced series. By bringing these exciting stories into Dane County classrooms, we encourage young people to take an interest in museums—to visit museums themselves. The Wisconsin Museum Series is an effective way to promote the arts in Wisconsin. It is also an effective way to reach many young readers who might not otherwise discover these wonderful museums.

Simpson Street Free Press students research Local History and Culture through an ongoing series of field trips within Dane County. Our staff reporters conduct first-person research through interviews with local historians, museum curators, and elder members of the community to learn more about Dane County’s past. Exploration and discovery are proven education strategies. And that’s what this project is: a series of explorations and discoveries. Thousands of readers, loyal readers of Dane County’s teen newspaper, discover fascinating episodes in local history on the pages of the Simpson Street Free Press. We have covered local history before. These topics are very popular among our younger readers. Recently a young reader from Hawthorne Elementary School wrote, “Dear Npib Thao, Thank you so much for your article because I am Hmong, and now I know more about my own culture. Thanks again!” Another young reader wrote “Dear Molly Killoran and Jazmin Jackson, I like your article about Cave of the Mounds and that it was discovered accidentally. I didn’t know that Ebenezer Brigham settled the area first. I was wondering whether or not they found gold in the cave.”

Our Literacy/BookLook initiative will promote literacy on a mass scale, in lasting and meaningful ways. The high school-age editors of the Simpson Street Free Press publish book lists, such as the Simpson Street Free Press Classic 25 and “Hidden Gems.” Young readers are encouraged to read books from these lists of quality literature. These reading lists, along with our increased circulation, create the kind of “buzz” that young people listen to. Students who write to us, demonstrating they have read five books from the lists, receive a gift certificate to an area bookseller. This new section also includes book reviews and a range of articles and columns that encourage reading. Simpson Street Free Press coverage is designed to complement the Madison School District’s middle school reading list. Our young readers are encouraged to explore their world through quality literature. This encouragement comes from highly effective local role models—the student writers of the Simpson Street Free Press.