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Press Release: Young Broadcasters of America Adopts ‘it’s learning’ Platform to Provide Communications and Broadcasting Courses
The story below is why what we do is so important!
Teen text addicts: Will your texting teen be able to communicate
effectively verbally?
April 21, 7:42 AM Broward County Parenting Teens Examiner Sue Scheff
Is texting replacing your teen’s ability to have conversations? Set limits.
Today more and more teens have cell phones. Teen texting between friends has now overtaken cell phone communications – and every very other common form of interaction. According to a recent study by PEW Research:
Is this a time parents need to pick and choose issues of concern? Yes and no. There are many other more serious issues such as drug abuse or gang relations, however if your teen is obsessed or addicted to texting, it may be time to intervene. Give your teen limits, and be sure there is a time that the phones are simply turned off.
Having consequences in place and following through with them can help convey to your teen that you are serious. Teens need to learn how to “talk” to others outside of texting. Parents should be concerned that all the texting may alter their ability to communicate effectively.
When it is time to apply to colleges or interview for a job, will they have the verbal skills they need? At last glance, you can’t text your way into employment or into a college.
In Florida, there is a bill in legislation that will ban texting and driving. Although many know the dangers of texting and driving, many still do it. Stress to your teens, no text is worth dying over. Encourage your teens to take the pledge and join thousands of others that are putting the cell phone aside as they drive.
Be an educated parent, you will have safer and healthier teens.
CONGRATULATIONS to Alex Barth!
“As one of eight winners in the “Totally Patriots” contest, Sharon resident Alex Barth will produce segments for WBZ’s pregame show this season.
But Barth is no stranger to the camera. He has worked in the media studio at Sharon High School hosting a news segment there, and is also working with Jimmy Young, a former sports broadcaster for NECN who created his own broadcasting school for a younger generation entitled Young Broadcasters of America.
“I was prepared I think from working with Jimmy, watching other broadcasters on TV, and the class I did at school. It was kind of an accumulation of a lot of things,” Barth said. ”
Read the entire article.
As Featured In The Boston Globe:
By Joseph P. Kahn Globe Staff / October 3, 2009
By Joseph P. Kahn Globe Staff / October 3, 2009
NATICK – Call them Generation ESPN.
They breakfast with “SportsCenter’’ and drift off at night listening to Joe Castiglione and Dave O’Brien call a Sox West Coast game. They dream of following in Jerry Remy’s footsteps someday – not necessarily by stepping into the ex-infielder’s cleats, but by warming the seat next to Don Orsillo’s in the NESN broadcast booth.
In short, they’re a lot like 10-year-old John Fulton, a Sherborn fifth-grader who’s polishing his broadcasting skills this fall at Young Sportscasters of America, a Natick training facility for RemDawg wannabes.
John doesn’t follow just the local pro sports teams. He follows every team in every major sport. This week during a taping of “Back Talk,’’ an hourlong sports talk show streamed over the YSA website, he broke down the Minnesota Vikings’ offense and Baltimore Ravens’ playoffs prospects. His debating partner: WCVB-TV weekend sports anchor Bob Halloran, who seemed both bemused and bewildered by the depth of John’s knowledge.
John’s mother would hardly have been surprised, though. “We go to friends’ houses,’’ says Luisa Cestari, “and he entertains them with the play-by-play from last night’s game.’’ Some even ask him for help making their Sunday football pool picks, she adds.
“Back Talk’’ and its cast of youthful commentators are showing up at a time when Boston’s pro teams have been enjoying unusual success – the Sox, Patriots, and Celtics have all won at least one championship in the past six years – and its sports media complex is also undergoing rapid expansion. ESPN.com recently added a Boston site to its lineup. Radio station 98.5 FM the Sports Hub is making a bold bid to challenge WEEI-AM’s sports talk supremacy. Major media entities and even the teams themselves are updating their websites and tacking on new sports blogs. All of this serves to amplify 24/7 chatter about everything from Tom Brady’s knee to Daisuke Matsuzaka’s value as the Sox third starting pitcher in the playoffs.
For kids like John Fulton and Max Kliman, a Needham seventh-grader taking classes at YSA, the trickle-down effect is as recognizable as Bill Belichick’s hoodie. They’re light-years beyond the casual-fan level of youthful sports interest. They know the games, the players, the highlight-reel videos, and who narrates them. They know what “P.T.I.’’ stands for and who on that show is interrupting whom.
Max, 13, logged his first hours behind a microphone during a weeklong camp in August. Dubious at first, he grew to love the experience so much that he signed up for after-school lessons this fall. Last week he was assigned to compile and read “Back Talk’’ news updates, which he pulled off with scarcely a hiccup.
A sports nut – Max plays soccer, basketball, tennis, and baseball – he watches ESPN “all the time,’’ he says, and particularly admires the work of “SportsCenter’’ anchors Stuart Scott and Hannah Storm. His best-case professional scenario, Max says, “would be like Jim Rice. Be a player first, then retire and work for a TV network.’’
Like Chris Woycik, 15, of Wrentham, another YSA summer camper, they may also conclude that becoming the next Tony Kornheiser could be as cool as becoming the next Dustin Pedroia. And more realistic. “You have to be really into sports to be here, because that’s really all we talk about,’’ Chris observed at a camp session a few weeks ago. He’d just gotten a tutorial (“Stop saying ‘we’ when you’re talking about the team, son’’) from ex-Sox broadcaster Jerry Trupiano in some of the finer points of doing baseball play-by-play.
Veteran Boston sportscaster Jimmy Young, who launched Young Sportscasters of America last spring, claims he’s no longer surprised when a fifth-grader starts reeling off names from the NFL’s weekly injury list, or smoothly narrates every scoring drive from a Boston College football game as if channeling his inner Chris Berman. Young has recruited 42 apprentice sportscasters, all boys aged 10-18, to his program so far. Word of mouth is his most potent marketing tool, according to Young. Parents figure, why not harness my child’s obsession with sports to some greater, more productive purpose? And Young is happy to oblige. Students pay between $100 and $300 monthly for classes covering skills like studio announcing, interviewing, TV production, and editing.
“I’m getting 14-year-olds with green screens in their basements,’’ says Young, referring to the monochromatic backdrops TV studios use for projecting images like weather maps. Kids like John Fulton may be precociously fluent in sports talk – “The stuff that comes out of his mouth makes us look at each other and say, ‘He’s 10?’ ’’ Young says with a laugh – but they’re not that unusual in marrying their passion for sports with their fascination for modern media techniques. What these kids learn by practicing in a fully equipped TV studio or radio booth, their efforts broadcast to actual viewers and listeners, helps them in all facets of communication, Young contends.
“We’re teaching them eye contact, enunciation, expanding their vocabulary, communication skills they can use in really any field,’’ says Young. “By sticking a camera on these kids, they get to see themselves as the world sees them.’’
Generation Text, meet Generation Teleprompter.
The idea behind the YSA program grew out of “Kid Company’s Sports World,’’ a Sunday night show Young hosted on NECN in the late 1990s. Young and his staff now help students produce a weekly radio show (airing on WBNW-AM and affiliates) along with the “Back Talk’’ webcast and a new student-produced sports blog. Jake Saltzman, a junior at Brookline High, recalls showing up at YSA camp and being paired with John and Max on a radio broadcast. “I was totally thrust into the fire,’’ says Jake, who’s taking after-school classes in Natick twice week.
While YSA continues to grow through viral marketing (its website links it with Young Broadcasters of America), it’s not the only training ground for aspiring Bermans and Scotts.
Play-by-Play Sports Broadcasting Camps operates summer camps for 8-to-18-year-olds in eight cities, including Boston. Jeremy Treatman, a former Philadelphia Inquirer sportswriter who started the camps in 2002, says that over the past five years alone the explosion in sports media has driven young people to consider its career options. “Twenty years ago, probably four out of five kids wanted to be pro athletes,’’ Treatman says, while today “it’s pretty even’’ between playing a pro sport and joining the broadcast team.
Christopher Cavalieri, a professor of communications at Boston University, brings 40 to 50 high-schoolers to campus each summer for workshops in media production and sports broadcasting. The proliferation of sports media – regional and national, broadcast and online – has “increased exponentially’’ in recent years, Cavalieri notes, and young people are taking notice. “This is a boom period, a perfect fit’’ for teenage media junkies with an interest in sports, he says.
Talking sports with a 10-year-old who’s smarter than he is can be disconcerting, Halloran jokes. Young agrees and says that on the YBA radio show, he hears adults express amazement about talking to teenagers about sports. Of course, some are amazed to find teens who will talk to adults, period.
Joseph P. Kahn can be reached at jkahn@globe.com.
NORTH ANDOVER – At 12, he is already getting comfortable in front of a television camera and envisioning a future as a sportscaster.
That future broadcaster is North Andover’s Adam Magaletta, who spent time this summer learning just what it takes to do that job at the Young Broadcasters of America summer camp in Natick.
“I’ve always loved sports and the Red Sox,” says Adam, a sixth-grader at St. Michael School. “So I thought I’d like to be a sportscaster. It’s a cool job. Looks fun. One day my mom got an e-mail from the [YBA] camp and I said, ‘Wow, that’s exactly what I’m looking for.’”
Adam spent the last week of July in front of green screens and conducting interviews. YBA founder Jimmy Young thinks Adam has what it takes.
“I can teach all sorts of broadcast skills to young people, but two things you can’t teach are looks and personality, and Adam has both,” says Young. “He is constantly smiling, eager to learn, and could have a bright future in broadcasting if he decides to pursue it as a career.”
Adam, who plays basketball and is now busy with fall baseball in the Dave Bettencourt League, has been practicing play-by-play broadcasting at home from a very young age. He says he enjoyed the challenges of broadcasting camp.
“I learned how to do a sports talk show, and one day Joe Joyce from ESPN came and showed us how to do a weather broadcast. We got to present a simulated weather report,” he says.
Young explains the importance of these experiences in front of the camera.
“At this point in development of young peoples’ on-air talent, I just want them to be comfortable in their own skin and on camera,” says Young. “We offer the opportunity for kids to see themselves as the world sees and hears them, and that can be an eye-opening experience.”
Adam’s mom Sue Magaletta says the trip to Natick was a challenge, but well worth the effort.
“All it took was one week of camp and Adam said, ‘This is for me — I want to be a sportscaster,’” says Sue. “It also gets them to sit up straight, speak in full sentences, and look at the camera and you in the eyes. It’s good for a resume and good training for interviews for college.”
Sue says she’s delighted that Young has secured a new studio off Peabody Square for this fall.
“I hope to do carpooling and get more kids involved in this program,” says Sue, who’s also been getting involved in acting this summer along with Adam’s younger brother Matthew, 9.
Adam’s family has been very supportive of his interest in sports and broadcasting. His dad Carlos Magaletta is an immigration lawyer, older brother Michael, 16, studies at St. John’s Prep, and younger brother Matthew was an extra, with Sue, in the locally filmed Hollywood films “Grownups” with Adam Sandler and “Zookeeper” with Kevin James.
Sue was a lawyer before staying home with the children, and plans to return to a career — but this time as a performer.
Young is looking forward to opening his new studio.
“I am very excited to bring our training to Peabody Access TV studios on Mondays and Thursdays this fall, and we look forward to developing a whole generation of new talent on the North Shore of Boston,” says Young of his new studio at 119 Foster St., off Route 114 in Peabody Square.
“This curriculum builds confidence, self esteem and awareness of their challenges with the English language,” says Young. “Best of all, it’s fun playing TV and every kid has a shot at creating their own show.”
By Mike Rubin
Tue Oct 13, 2009, 05:40 PM EDT
Randolph -
For a pair of local aspiring broadcasters, it was simply an opportunity of a lifetime. After spending 20 hours of intense training on the air, both Stoughton’s Dan Shulman and Randolph’s Marcus Jackson have developed into promising sports broadcasters in the electronic media industry.
In less than a year, Young Sportscasters of America has managed to grab the area by storm, enrolling close to 100 students. Located in Natick, the academy boasts three studios and is also in the process of creating a satellite studio in Peabody to accommodate the school’s growing needs and enrollment.
Wicked Local Photo by Lauren DeFilippo
Founded by former Emmy award winning sports television broadcaster Jimmy Young, the program entails 10 workshop classes that last anywhere from 20 weeks to a year. Upon completion of the classes, students are entitled to serve as part of the program, hosting their own programs on a weekly to monthly basis.
“Ever since we launched the program, it’s really taken off,’’ said Young. “The kids are just unbelievable, and the responses I’ve been getting are off the charts. We didn’t know what was going to happen when we first launched the company off the ground, but when we did, it soared beyond everyone’s expectations.”
Young’s plan kicked off during the mid-1990s when he hosted “Kid Company’s Sports World.” During its reign on the airwaves on New England Cable News, it received rave reviews and developed a local following.
Shortly after the program ended, Young continued to anchor on various shifts at local networks throughout New England. Recently, Young served as a guest writer/blogger and columnist for the Boston Globe.
“When I was at the (Boston Globe), I had a vision of creating a school like this,’’ said Young. “We want to go out and open doors for younger kids, who normally don’t have the opportunity to be involved in something, like this. “We’re very excited to provide this type of opportunity for young people, and we’re already accomplishing what we set out to do.”
Shulman, 13, and a Stoughton native, has aspired to be a broadcaster for over a decade, and has excelled in the program. During his time as a student and as a member, he’s interviewed various athletes like Patriots’ running back Laurence Maroney, members of the Boston Red Sox as well as other well-known local sports figures.
“I think it’s fun,” Shulman, a Boston College fan, said of his time on-air.
He enjoys being able to share his opinions about the games with his fellow broadcasters and the audience.
“Dan (Shulman) has really come a long way since the beginning of the program,’’ said Young. “(Dan) has the natural poise and has the desire to pursue a career in the business. He’s got a great voice for broadcasting, and he’s calm and cool on the air. He asks very intelligent questions, and he’s not afraid to go after the news.”
A freshman at Catholic Memorial in West Roxbury, Shulman said he’s noticed a difference in himself since starting the program. He’s seen himself speaking more, and slowing down when he does.
Shulman, who recently graduated from the program, is in the process of creating a weekly show for the academy, which can be aired as webcast on both You Tube and the Academy’s Web site.
“Danny is a great kid, and he has what it takes to succeed in this business,’’ said Young. “He was an absolute pleasure to work with, and he’s got an unlimited potential to succeed. With the hard work and desire he has, he can be a rising star.”
Wicked Local Photo by Lauren DeFilippo
As for the future, Shulman is split evenly on his career path. He’d either like to be a sportscaster or a chef, he said.
Jackson, 15, also a student at Catholic Memorial, has also emerged as a fine broadcaster in the academy. Through intense instruction from accomplished sportscasters as Bob Halloran of Channel 5, former Sox broadcaster and current 98.5 FM Sports Hub Talk show host Jerry Trupiano and long-time host Jimmy Myers, Jackson managed to greatly improve his vernacular while gaining the confidence on the air while hosting his own shows.
“(Jackson) has got great potential to be a sportscaster,’’ said Young. “We work on the kids on their accents, and how they speak and look in front of the camera. We also work with them on show preparation and their appearance. At first it seems a little overwhelming for them, but after a while they buy into the program and towards the end of the program, they’re like different people.”
Jackson, who’s also completed the program, has also hosted a wide variety of shows, interviewing such athletes as Red Sox Kevin Youkilis, various members of the Celtics and Patriots as well as other college and professional athletes in the area.
Jackson said the program give kids with a good knowledge of sports an outlet to share that information.
“It doesn’t take up a lot of time. You watch sports, (then) you come in and talk about it,” he said.
Like Shulman, Jackson said he’s noticed a change in himself not only on air but in other areas of life.
He said he’s better at speaking in front of a crowd, and can more clearly ask questions and make points.
“(Jackson) has really matured into an adult professional on the air,’’ said Young. “Sometimes the kids go on the air, wearing the hat backwards and the baggy jeans, but when we work with them on their appearance, their speech and their mannerisms, then they’re heading in the right direction. (Jackson) is a great kid, and he has some insight on the topics when he interviews the athletes, because he’s a high school athlete himself.”
Looking ahead, Jackson isn’t sure if he’s set on sportscasting for a career, but he definitely wants to do something with talking, he said.
Not only does the Young Sportscasters of America Academy focus on sports, but also arts and entertainment, hard news and weather. Currently, the academy hosts such stations as Trendy Teen TV, a weather station and a newscaster station.
“We try to cover everything in broadcasting,’’ said Young. “We not just do sports, but we focus on the arts and entertainment industry, as well as being a news anchor. We’ve managed to get a lot of inquiries on not just sports, but everything.”
The academy also offers three different tiered broadcasting curriculums. Tier 1 involves hosting a TV show, PA address announcing, as well as weathercasting and meteorology, while Tier 2 focuses on behind the scenes, remote reporting and news conferencing. Tier 3 features 20 hours of one-on-one production, a resume tape and, hosting an individual show, a field interview and eight hours of editing time.
“The courses are pretty intense, but the kids love them,’’ said Young. “The great thing is that all of these kids have the hard work and desire to learn. They’ve put so much time into it, and it’s great to see them pursue their passions. I wish I had something like this when I was younger.”
For more information about the academy, visit www.youngsportscasters.com or call 508-651-4972.
