From Field Trips to the Future: Connecting The Dottes Comes to Rosedale
Three former Grant Elementary School Interns are bringing their experience—and their voices—into a new chapter of youth media at Rosedale Middle School.
By Levi Lee
Sometimes you don’t know where one opportunity will lead.
A field trip becomes an interview. An interview becomes confidence. Confidence becomes curiosity. Curiosity becomes a skill. And before long, a young person who once stood behind a camera wondering how everything worked is stepping forward ready to tell the next story.
That is what Connecting The Dottes is designed to do.
This fall, the Jegna Klub is bringing the Connecting The Dottes After School Klub to Rosedale Middle School, creating a hands-on multimedia experience specifically for seventh- and eighth-grade Scholar Interns.
But three students aren’t walking into this experience for the first time.
Valarie Prieto-Pardo, Cornelius Springfield and Galilea Guzman have already had a taste of what Connecting The Dottes can become. All three previously participated as Connecting The Dottes Grant Elementary Interns—and now they’re part of the After School Klub at Rosedale.
Their previously recorded interviews will help tell the story of where they’ve been, while the Klub gives them an opportunity to show us where they’re going.
Galilea & Cornelius: Learning Beyond the School Walls
For Galilea Guzman and Cornelius Springfield, one of those early experiences took them outside the traditional classroom and into the professional environment of Duncan Aviation at the Charles Wheeler Airport.
Their previously recorded interviews from that field trip represent something bigger than a trip: exposure.
That’s a major piece of Connecting The Dottes.
We want Scholar Interns to see careers, workplaces and possibilities they may not encounter during an ordinary school day. Then we put cameras, microphones and questions in their hands and challenge them to document what they discover.
At Rosedale, that philosophy will continue.
Field experiences won’t simply be about going somewhere. Scholar Interns will prepare before they leave, research the people and organizations they’re visiting, develop questions, conduct interviews, capture video and photography, and bring that material back to create stories.
The process is simple:
Prepare. Experience. Interview. Record. Create. Reflect.
Gali and Cornelius have already experienced part of that cycle. Now, as members of the After School Klub, they’ll have an opportunity to build on it.
Valarie: Sitting Across From the Judge
Valarie Prieto-Pardo’s previous Connecting The Dottes experience looked different.
She interviewed Judge Tony Martinez.
Think about what that means for a middle-school student.
You have to research your guest. Prepare meaningful questions. Listen carefully. Maintain eye contact. Follow the conversation. Speak clearly. Think on your feet—and have enough confidence to sit across from an accomplished professional and know that your questions deserve to be heard.
That’s education you can’t always measure with a worksheet.
Valarie’s interview represents the heart of JegnaTalk: For Youth By Youth, where Scholar Interns learn to explore a guest’s Experience, Story and Perspective—ESP.
At Rosedale, those conversations will continue with professionals, entrepreneurs, business owners, community leaders, elected officials, journalists, athletes, coaches and others whose experiences can introduce students to possibilities beyond what they already know.
Now, Rosedale Has Motion
Connecting The Dottes isn’t simply an after-school media club.
Mondays will operate like a production room: researching stories, assigning roles, developing questions, writing scripts and storyboarding productions.
Thursdays are where those ideas become content.
Scholar Interns will explore TV and radio broadcasting, video journalism, sports journalism, podcasting, photography, interviewing, audio/video production, editing, digital storytelling and content creation.
They’ll also develop original recurring productions.
Talkin A Lil Rosedale will tell stories about Rosedale’s students, staff, programs, athletics, achievements and alumni.
A Lil Yap Session and Talkin A Lil Tea will give Scholar Interns opportunities to discuss school-appropriate subjects that matter to their generation while learning the difference between opinion, commentary, rumors and responsible media.
And then there’s 500 Got Motion.
Its mission is right in the tagline:
“If it’s moving in KCKPS sports, we got it.”
Scholar Interns will learn to cover student-athletes, teams, coaches, matchups, rivalries, accomplishments and the people behind KCKPS athletics—not simply as spectators, but as developing student journalists.
The ultimate goal is authentic experience: cameras courtside, microphones in hand, questions prepared and students learning how professional media actually works.
Connecting More Than Dottes
The name has always meant more than connecting locations.
We’re connecting people, opportunities and possibilities.
Scholar Interns will learn how to build their Personal, Operational and Strategic Networks—understanding how relationships with family, peers, educators, mentors, professionals and community leaders can support their growth.
They’ll participate in career-connected field experiences, service-learning opportunities and capstone productions while creating tangible work for their portfolios.
And that brings us back to Gali, Cornelius and Valarie.
Their Duncan Aviation and Judge Tony Martinez interviews aren’t the end of their stories. They’re evidence of where the stories started.
Now they’re entering Rosedale’s Connecting The Dottes After School Klub with something incredibly valuable: experience.
Soon, they’ll be joined by other Scholar Interns picking up cameras, asking their first interview questions, producing their first stories and discovering talents they didn’t know they had.
Some will want to be on camera.
Others will discover that their place is behind it.
Some may become journalists, filmmakers, broadcasters, photographers, editors, producers or entrepreneurs.
Others may choose completely different careers—but they’ll carry communication, confidence, teamwork, networking and storytelling with them.
Because at the Jegna Klub, the camera has never been the destination.
It’s the vehicle.
And at Rosedale Middle School, the next generation is getting ready to move.
Welcome to Connecting The Dottes.
Welcome to 500 Got Motion.
Welcome to what’s next.
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