COVID-19 has hit businesses and tourism hard. But when New York said it would close a famous ice rink, Serena Sabet fought back — and won. This is the first of five articles by students at The Hewitt School in New York City about how COVID-19 has affected that city...
They are 8,000 miles from Myanmar, but Burmese in the U.S. are raising money in a fight for the restoration of democracy in the Asian nation. A recent protest against the military coup in Myanmar, in Indianapolis, Indiana (courtesy of Elaisa Vahnie) This story was a...
I was taught that Modern Colonialism was a force for global good. Later I learned it was a system of exploitation, oppression and enslavement. World empires and colonies in 1914, just before World War One (Wikimedia Commons). As the leaders of the Commonwealth of...
Inspired by Black Lives Matter protests, I offer a photo essay as a haunting reminder that the fight continues decades after the Civil Rights Movement. This story won a third prize in News Decoder’s Ninth Storytelling Contest. With my photography project, I...
The Black Lives Matter movement has stirred young people around the globe and raised hopes that racism and police brutality against Blacks can be curbed. For many elders, the hopes are tinged by nagging fears that a generation from now race relations will remain strained and injustices will persist. Lucy Bird, a 17-year-old student at Westover School, captures those worries in her haunting series of photos that juxtapose iconic images from the U.S. Civil Rights Movement with glimpses from BLM protests.
Exercise: Ask your students to apply their photo skills to create a visual essay that manipulates existing photographs to capture their concerns about the future.
The U.S. wants to end its longest war and withdraw from Afghanistan—called by some the graveyard of empires. But a May 1 deadline looks uncertain. U.S. military carry the casket of a soldier killed in Afghanistan, Dover, Delaware, 12 June 2017. (EPA-EFE/SCOTT SERIO)...
Born in China, I decided to study in the U.S. I love my home country but harbor guilt as I become less and less Chinese over time. Photo by Markus Winkler This story was a runner-up in News Decoder’s Ninth Storytelling Contest. Artist’s Statement: I grew up in...
Growing up means eventually coming to terms with one’s upbringing. Doing so can be especially challenging for young people straddling different cultures. In a five-stanza poem, Li Keira Yin of The Thacher School explores the contradictions between the world of her Chinese grandparents and her life at a boarding school in the United States. News Decoder helps young people around the world extend their horizons and learn to appreciate different viewpoints. Some have the advantage of confronting opposing outlooks at an early age, and Yin demonstrates her maturity in reconciling the inherent antagonism between her two very distinct cultures.
Exercise: Ask each student to identify a fault line within their family and to write an essay or poem that is sympathetic to each side.
Ping-pong players paved the way for a thaw in relations between China and the U.S. in the early 1970s. I witnessed this pivotal moment in history. Flanked by Chinese border officials, Glen Cowan, a member of the U.S. ping-pong team, waves to newsmen at Lowu, China,...
News Decoder’s correspondents have covered many of the biggest international stories of the past half-century, offering our students an unparalleled historical perspective on complex global events. Jonathan Sharp has tapped his rich professional adventures time and again for News Decoder, producing yarns about covering the Vietnam War and showing U.S. actress Shirley MacLaine around Beijing. In his latest article, Sharp recounts witnessing a pivotal moment in China-U.S. relations in 1971, when a team of U.S. ping-pong players visited China, paving the way to a thaw in relations between the two nations. Sharp skillfully mixes personal anecdotes with an impartial look at history to transport students born more than a generation after the “transformative moment” back in time.
Exercise: Ask each of your students to speak to at least one parent to identify a moment in their youth when they witnessed an important event. After interviewing the parent, the student should write an article mixing the parent’s viewpoint in the first person with third-person background and explanation.
A civil war in Yemen marked by foreign meddling has created an unparalleled humanitarian disaster with no end in sight, even if a truce were agreed upon. A malnourished child waits to be fed at a hospital in Sana’a, Yemen, 21 March 2021. (EPA-EFE/YAHYA ARHAB) A...
News Decoder is backed by dozens of veteran correspondents who have covered many of the world’s biggest and most complicated stories of the past half-century. Mentors to students in our partner schools, the correspondents are experts in their own right in many of the world’s most intractable and consequential issues. Cutbacks in spending on foreign news means some big stories don’t receive the attention they deserve in mainstream Western media. But Alistair Lyon, a former Middle Eastern diplomatic correspondent for Reuters, won’t let News Decoder readers forget the humanitarian disaster underway in Yemen. Have your students read this article to learn about the complex conflict gripping Yemen and ask them to identify other ongoing humanitarian crises that are not grabbing headlines.
California’s water supplies are being squeezed by climate change. By better capturing, recycling and distributing water, the state can avert a crisis. A dry reservoir bed in Cupertino, California, 13 March 2014 (AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez) Water has long been...
Beset by raging wildfires and drought, Californians could be forgiven for thinking a climate Armageddon is upon them. The easy assumption would be that global warming means the most populous U.S. state does not have enough water for its many farmers and citizens. Keira Yin of The Thacher School provides a fuller picture by interviewing a water resilience expert and probing data. She concludes that stepped-up efforts to better capture, recycle and distribute water could go a long way towards ensuring the state can fend off the effects of climate change. Ask your students to consider how climate change is affecting water supplies in your region and to identify what the government is or could be doing about it.
For the fourth time in three decades, a divided Italy has named a technocrat as its leader. Is Mario Draghi a model for nations shouldering huge debts? Street art depicting Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi dressed as a magician pulling a rabbit out of the hat,...