m*STAR website www.mstar.org.uk/

m*STAR - Multimedia Students At Risk Project

June 2002

The m*STAR Story

As the m*STAR experience was deliberately targeted at students at risk of not completing their schooling we had to ensure our production techniquies took account of the range of educational skills and personal issues that were inhibiting their school and social progress. To proactively address these issues the m*STAR Project Team developed an innovative animation techniques that enabled the young people to develop characters or ‘avatars’, based on their digital photograph. With these characters the group was able to collectively explore difficult issues such as peer group pressure, anti-social behaviour, high-risk activities and bullying in the ‘third person’.

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The m*STAR experience highlighted the great need that young people have to be creative and to work in partnership with adults to achieve a common goal. A constant theme that emerged, both in casual conversation and in formal self-evaluation sessions, was the lack of engagement participants had with adults. They all felt the m*STAR experience gave them a unique opportunity to mix with a range of adults within a workplace setting. Several of them described the m*STAR experience as the first time they had talked with adults other than family or teachers.

The m*STAR project is fundamentally different from traditional work experience programs. In these students have to ‘fit’ into the concerns and priorities of the host employer, with minimal opportunities to be involved in decision-making. In the m*STAR experience the students and adults worked together to determine common goals, order priorities, solve problems and establish work patterns. All of the participants rated the ‘real workplace’ environment and the inclusive goal setting and decision-making as the most important feature of the m*STAR experience. In addition the focus on building social skills through informal interactions is a critical feature of the workplace setting. Having meal breaks together, all being addressed on first name basis, sharing stories and jokes were all part of the m*STAR experience.

In understanding the m*STAR experience it is easy to focus on the tangible output of the brief ‘FLASH’ animation and the skills and technology associated with it’s production. However the m*STAR experience was able to demonstrate to young people their capacity to create and distribute their own stories. In the experience of Mediac, many young people from Manor and Castle are disengaged from many of the social structures and institutions in their world. They feel powerless to effect, control or change these institutions. Their attitude towards mainstream media is no different. The m*STAR experience opened participants to the possibility of being able to create and disseminate ‘content’ on their own terms. The ability to develop and create relevant multimedia content is critical to addressing the digital divide.

To create multimedia productions requires detailed knowledge of technology and complex computer software. The participants in the m*STAR experience were not expected to be able to master these skills in four (4) days. The m*STAR Project Team identified manageable technical tasks which could be undertaken by the participants without prior skills. These included: creating the ‘avatars’, taking digital photographs, recording and processing sound and music. The more complex tasks were handled by the m*STAR Project Team but the participants had editorial control of this content. To achieve this balance required skill and patience of members of the m*STAR Project Team.

A summary of the first evaluation report can be downloaded here as a .RTF format document.

The m*STAR website can be found by following this link www.mstar.org.uk/