The cliché “last but not least” certainly applies to this week of VOX Media Café. Although it’s the last week of VMC, teens in Advanced Literary Nonfiction week have been busy writing and learning from professionals.

 On Monday, we enhanced our personal essays with writers and reporters Moni Basu and Valerie Boyd. We began the day by consolidating long sentences. Our instructors managed to bring a 21-word sentence down to eight words! After writing concise sentences, we focused on personal stories we’ve been writing for VOX. Moni and Valerie challenged us to do a “six word memoir” for our stories. This technique allowed us to keep in mind the focus of our essay throughout the writing and editing process.

 On Tuesday, Bill Macklin and Andy Sarvady ran a helpful and question-filled workshop on college essays for VOXers. We started by discussing what admissions look for in college essays, and then ...

It’s the next to last week of VOX Media Cafe and Advanced Visual Storytelling Week! We started off on Monday looking for our favorite photography portraits in different magazines and then taking self portraits of each other around the VOX office and  Peachtree Center with instructor Joey Ivansco. Joey has had his work published in Time, Newsweek, New York Times, Wall Street Journal and the Atlanta Journal Constitution.

On Tuesday we took a trip to Atlanta Botanical Garden to take different pictures of plants and flowers, using macro photography, rule of thirds, distortion, and texture techniques. Out of all the pictures we took, (up to 300 images!), we each had to chose our top 10 favorites. 

On Wednesday VMC students had a Photoshop 101 lesson with former AJC photographers Chris Hunt and Dave Tulis. We got the chance to edit our pictures from the Atlanta Botanical Garden and received advice ...

It is already the fourth week of VOX Media Café! That means there are only a few more weeks of summer and VMC. This week’s Literary Nonfiction workshops are more exciting than they sounds! Teens kicked off the week with Atlanta-based freelance writer Michele Marill and NY Times bestselling author Joshilyn Jackson. There was not only writing, but acting as well. Teens were asked to portray their favorite verbs with motions. Some snuck in the room while others crawled and jumped. VMC teens dove into the past by writing a letter to themselves when they were in 6th grade.

 During the next two days of VMC, novelist Jessica Handler and editor Eileen Drennen jumped right into essay writing. Handler and Drennen strayed away from the standard five-paragraph essay; students were encouraged to look at the versatility of essay writing. After putting pen to paper, students took a break in the ...

Hear Ye! Hear Ye! Now presenting Week Three of VOX Media Café: Reporting. This week the teens took a trip to CNN for a lunch-and-learn session on diversity. They learned about the importance diversity in the news and in the office. On Tuesday, they enjoyed a wonderful treat. The VMC students and interns headed to Hard Rock Café for lunch and to hear a three-song performance from teen band, 10 Miles of Blue and then did a press conference with them.

Prepping for the press conference included a session on interviewing basics and a pretend red carpet exercise with our teen interns acting as celebrities such as Whoopi Goldberg, Ashton Kutcher, “Basketball Wives” star Evelyn Lozado, Miley Cyrus, and Taylor Swift.  Wednesday was radio reporting day and VMC students worked with Joe Hirsch from Youth Radio and veteran reporter David Simpson to record news pieces for radio.

 Thanks to our ...