Smithsonian Magazine

   The media enjoy an excellent reputation at Brooklyn's Public School 41, where making news is helping inner city students exceed expectations. Panasonic's commitment to provide 200 elementary and junior high schools with complete state-of-the-art video production studios has created an enthusiasm for learning in the classroom that makes students compete to participate in classes, and made Jeff Goldstein and his P.S. 41 students the recipients of a 1998 Computerworld Smithsonian Award for Education.

Secaucus Reporter (Hoboken, NJ - 6/13/99)

   Even though Weehawken won top honors in Panasonic's Kid Witness News contest this year, students and teachers at Huber Street School in Secaucus feel proud of their first production.
    Kid Witness News (KWN) is a hands-on video education program developed and supported by Secaucus-based Panasonic in conjunction with public schools across the nation. By supplying students with equipment they need to create video news projects, Panasonic hopes to encourage students to develop valuable cognitive commucative and organizational skills through the use of video.
    In 1989, when the program started, 17 schools in five cities were involved. This grew to 200 schools in 117 cities this year.
    "We heard Panasonic was doing this Kid Witness News program in the schools and we applied," said Linda Chervenak, who, along with Lucille Wright, serves as the school district's technology coordinator, not just for KWN, but for a host of other technology-based programs designed to help integrate technology into the classroom.
    Although this aspect of technology involves video decks, cameras and computers, both Chervenak and Wright make the point that technology can be anything from building blocks to satellites, and stress this lesson when instructing the students.
    Once Huber Street applied for the KWN program, Panasonic provided the school with an array of computer equipment which has transformed a former utility closet into a full-fledged production studio. This, combined with a deal made with Comcast Cable to provide cable television programming, gave the school a remarkable educational boost.

Herald-Hoffman Estates (Chicago, IL - 5/22/99)

   Three Des Plains students are leaving today for New York City to receive an award for their video titled "Can Dreams Come True?"
    Algonquin Middle School students, all 13 years old, will receive the award from the Panasonic Corporation, which sponsors the Kid Witness News program.
    "They're excited. They've been counting down the days for the last two weeks," said Dorothy Henson, who teaches English-as-a-Second-Language and will accompany the students.
    The two-minute long claymation video features a student being excluded in school by other students in different situations.
    Each time the student is shunned, a claymation heart in the video breaks.
    In the final scene, the students hear the famous "I Have A Dream" speech by slain civil rights leader Martin Luther King.
    After the students hear the speech, they surround the student as the video ends.
   The video took the students three months to create. Henson said eight students helped out on the video with the three making the trip putting the most work into the project.
    The video was named by the Kid Witness News program as the best in its New Vision category.