Dissertation Study - Youth Digital Storytelling

My name is Caroline and I am a doctoral candidate in the School of Social Work at the University of Georgia. This summer, I am relocating from Georgia to Albany, NY to conduct my dissertation study to chronical Youth FX, an amazing digital storytelling and filmmaking program for young filmmakers, titled "Digital Storytelling and Fostering Collective Efficacy: Arts-Based Youth Participatory Action Research and Constructing Community."

This is the first study conducted with Youth FX. Using a youth participatory action research (YPAR) model, young people, staff, and I will work together to chronicle the experiences of young people participating in Youth FX’s flagship summer digital media and filmmaking program. We will explore how a co-creative digital storytelling process impacts young peoples’ meaning-making about developing a sense of community and reclamation through storying. I am hoping you will help support this amazing project!

 

So, what is this study about? Youth FX works to change the narrative of young people living in city contexts by creating a centripetal force that fosters a co-creative community. While the narrative of young people in cities typically focuses on risks and violence, Youth FX helps young people to use storying as reclamation and to consider joy, connection, critical consciousness, and the inherent support systems that emerge from urban communities. They learn crucial technical and creative skills, work collectively to create ideas and works of digital film art, and amplify the voices within their communities through their films. Youth FX has become a local cornerstone resource for young people through their work and fosters collective efficacy, basically a sense of community that works to make social change. Together, they directly challenge the issues that impact their communities and work to make change while they capture the essence of what makes communities like theirs home.

 

This is the story they want to share with the world.

 

I plan to be 'on the ground' with Youth FX observing their day-to-day activities and working together to make a documentary film about their processes. We will conduct interviews, focus groups, and I will train young people in research practices such as data collection. Young people and I will analyze data and use poetic transcription to create poetic works of art about the sense of community and collective efficacy young people experience through Youth FX using the words from the data collected. Finally, it is clear that Youth FX creates a sense of community not only for young people in the program but for the broader local community as well as the ecosystem of socially-engaged artists of color nationally. Woven into this sense of community is an emerging theory that we are excited to explore...but I won't say too much before this study is completed and this dissertation is written!

 

Whoa, that’s a lot…How can we help? To do such an intensive qualitative study, I will need to decrease how much I work to accommodate the time necessary for the study and my relocation to Albany for 2 months. The time required for this study means a sharp decrease in my family's income for several months until my dissertation is completed. For anyone that knows me, I work, well…a lot! So, I will be pulling back quite a bit to complete this dissertation. The goal is to complete my dissertation by the end of November and defend in December - a bold timeline but one that puts me in the position of both completing my degree before having to pay another semester's tuition, to focus my energy on attaining a tenure-track academic position, selling our home, and wrapping up my long clinical career as well as ensuring that Youth FX has this study’s findings to attain future funding and help grow programs.  Crowdsourcing to help with the additional costs for this study is the only feasible way to make this happen.

 

What will the funds be used for?  Your support will help me to purchase any required technology and software for data collection and analysis [I need to invest in a new computer (this current one is on its way out), NVivo data analysis software, transcription services, and recording technology]. Your support will allow me to provide snacks and participant compensation for interviews and focus groups. Your support will also help me offset costs related to travel and housing. While I applied for multiple funding sources, I only received a small assistantship-based award to assist with completing my dissertation. After fees for the required credits I had to sign up for related to the assistantship, I am left with only $2000, which will help offset part of my expenses but unfortunately leaves me in need of additional financial support to make this study happen. Roughly, the costs directly related to this study include:

- Participant incentives: $800 - 1000
- Interview and Focus Group refreshments: $100
- New MacAir computer with extra storage, extra memory, and Final Cut Pro for developing a documentary: $2000
- NVivo Qualitative Data Analysis Software License: $600
- Otter.Ai transcription licenses for Youth Co-Researchers: $720
- Interview recorder/microphone combo: $150
- Travel & Housing: $4000

 

Will you keep us updated? Yes, of course! Also, I will happily share the link to our final documentary once it is ready for release in Spring 2023 (after I defend my dissertation). This has been quite the journey from entering a PhD program at an R1 institute while raising a family and working full-time. Then BAM! Covid hit. I have stayed focused and worked hard to get to this point, but it has been more than a juggling act.  I am grateful for any assistance to make sure I cross the finish line and help to amplify the tremendous work Youth FX does. I truly appreciate everyone’s support.