Contact:

Open Youth Networks
Director, Mindy Faber
mindyfaber@comcast.net
847-902-9158

Chicago Filmmakers
5243 N. Clark Ave
Chicago,IL 60640

Creating a Freer Youth Culture

Open Youth Networks (OYN) responds to the need for young people to have a voice in the democratic decisions and policies that affect their lives by designing, implementing and disseminating best practices in digital media education for youth. We believe that in the 21st century, innovative educational media practices can help youth bring cultural production and participatory politics together in a way that creates a freer youth culture. OYN puts youth in charge of adapting their own native culture (genres, tools, languages and networking systems) to effectively engage in the institutions of civic, educational and cultural life.  By interpreting, using and producing media in a variety of forms, OYN assists young people in the pursuit of their current and future roles as socially conscious digital content producers and change agents.
Programs
Programs of Open Youth Networks include: 1)  YouthLAB – model curricula and workshops in emergent media and digital literacy for diverse groups of Chicago youth; 2) YouthPUBLICS – networked and face-to-face public presentations, trainings, screenings, dialogues, articles, conferences and P2P content sharings that serve to increase public  awareness and understanding of youth issues through digital media;  and, 3) YouthWORK– individually conceived and developed projects in which youth harness their own digital native cultures for purposes of organizing, expression and civic participation with the support of OYN and its allies.