Beyond Borders: Personal Stories From a Small Planet

Young people are favorite targets of mass media, but rarely do they have the opportunity to create programming. Beyond Borders aims to remedy that imbalance. Adult mentors and media professionals at Listen Up! Youth Media Network train and assist youngsters, age 13-19, to write, shoot, edit and even animate short films that chronicle their experiences in challenging circumstances. The 2006 films include Diana Guevara’s powerful account of her rape by a gang-member neighbor in Guatemala City, Guatemala, and how discovering theater restored her self-esteem and gave her a sense of purpose. Only 10, Mohamed Sidibay, of Freetown, Sierra Leone, depicts his earlier life as a machinegun-toting child soldier. Sahar Adish, now a pre-med student at the University of Virginia, recalls her educated family’s persecution by and escape from the Taliban in Afghanistan. For believing young people have important stories to tell and providing them with the means to turn them into films, a Peabody goes to Beyond Borders: Personal Stories from a Small Planet.