Norah Weiner (L) and Erika Young (R), the grand-prize winners in grades 5-8 of NPR’s Student Podcast Challenge, at Presidio Middle School in San Francisco.

Talia Herman for NPR

cover caption

toggle caption

Talia Herman for NPR

Norah Weiner (L) and Erika Young (R), the grand-prize winners in grades 5-8 of NPR’s Student Podcast Challenge, at Presidio Middle School in San Francisco.

Talia Herman for NPR

School shootings, social media, magnificence requirements and fast-changing trend developments – say that 5 instances quick.

Adolescence has all the time been powerful, however the acceleration of contemporary forces makes it extra disturbing than ever. In the phrases of two San Francisco greatest associates – the center faculty winners of this yr’s NPR Student Podcast Challenge – welcome to Middle School Now.

In a classroom at Presidio Middle School, not removed from the Golden Gate Bridge, 13-year-olds Erika Young and Norah Weiner sat down to inform us about their podcast. It is considered one of two Grand Prize winners chosen by our judges from more than 3,300 submissions from 48 states, in addition to the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico.

The two associates simply completed the seventh grade, however have not been separated but — they’ve seen one another on daily basis since faculty let loose. Norah exhibits as much as our interview carrying boots that she borrowed from Erika for the big day. Their giddy laughter fills the empty faculty, their power fueled by the information that, in just some days, they’re off to summer season camp collectively.

While our highschool winner this yr tackled a big local news story, with reporting from college students and educators, Erika and Norah took on a extra common expertise – the ups and downs of being a middle-schooler as we speak.

“Gun violence, social media and mental health are literally shaping middle school,” Erika says of their podcast.

They stroll listeners via their day-to-day lives – the whole lot from faculty lockdowns to TikTook dances within the lavatory – and the way life in center faculty as we speak is completely different from when their English instructor, Jenny Chio, was a pupil.

“I went through it, and you guys are going through it,” says Chio (pronounced CHEW), evaluating her youth with the expertise of as we speak’s college students. “I think it’s the same amount of pressure, but just amplified.”

One factor our judges cherished about this podcast is the way in which the scholars wove in nationwide developments with what’s taking place in their very own faculty and neighborhood. They interviewed their classmates and lecturers about heavy matters which are, sadly, additionally part of their each day lives.

Like lockdown drills.

A grim actuality for center faculty college students and lecturers

Norah Weiner

Talia Herman for NPR

cover caption

toggle caption

Talia Herman for NPR

Erika and Norah say they’ve had lockdown drills since early elementary faculty, however just lately, their center faculty had one which wasn’t only a drill – prompted by an unknown occasion close by. Although everybody was advantageous, the expertise nonetheless made the ladies suppose in another way about their relationship to highschool shootings.

“I can promise you that every child in our sixth- through eighth-grade school has imagined who they’d be in a shooting,” Norah says within the podcast. “Would they run? Would they hide?”

In interviews, their classmates share what they suppose they’d do in a faculty capturing: “I would run home and call the police”; “Find somewhere to hide and then just stay there”; “I’d try to text my parents and tell them, if anything bad happened, I love them.”

Erika Young

Talia Herman for NPR

cover caption

toggle caption

Talia Herman for NPR

Erika Young

Talia Herman for NPR

Chio, however, cannot bear in mind ever having an lively shooter drill when she was in center or highschool. The solely emergency drills again then revolved round pure disasters: earthquakes or hurricanes. But she’s all too accustomed to lockdowns lately.

The pupil journalists requested her to point out them the emergency package in her classroom, which amongst different objects, has one shocking ingredient: cat litter. Chio says that if a lockdown lasted for a number of hours, she might use it, together with different toiletries, to create a DIY lavatory.

TikTook as middle-school trend-setter

Luckily, there is extra to center faculty than lockdowns. One pressure that dominates each their digital and in-person world? TikTook.

“Nowadays, when walking to school, you’ll see girls literally surrounding the building who are dancing,” Norah says within the podcast. “The dances look kind of weird because they’ve likely come from TikTok.”

Erika provides, “You can’t hear the music. And so you just see kids, like, moving their arms over their heads and like just dancing around. They look like jellyfish, and it’s really funny.”

Winners of NPR’s Student Podcast Challenge, Norah Weiner and Erika Young, with their instructor Jenny Chio, at Presidio Middle School in San Francisco.

Talia Herman for NPR

cover caption

toggle caption

Talia Herman for NPR

Winners of NPR’s Student Podcast Challenge, Norah Weiner and Erika Young, with their instructor Jenny Chio, at Presidio Middle School in San Francisco.

Talia Herman for NPR

But TikTook’s affect goes past their viral dances. “Trends like baggy pants, crop corset tops, curtain bangs, ripped jeans are all instigated from this app,” Erika says of their podcast.

These quickly shifting, and far-reaching developments are an inevitable a part of the center faculty expertise, particularly because the return to the classroom after the pandemic.

“I’ve been to different states, and people there dress exactly the same as they do here, kids my age and it’s really weird,” Erika says. “Because I thought different places had different things that were popular.”

Chio remembers properly that feeling of attempting to maintain up with the most recent developments, and failing. She and her college students bonded over that dropping battle to be “cool” in center faculty.

“It’s like I’m going to be uncool no matter what,” Norah laughs, “so maybe I should just stick with what I’m doing right now.”

But fortunately, the buddies have one another to make it via. And what they’re doing proper now, making a podcast and amplifying their classmates’ voices, continues to be fairly cool.

To hearken to Erika and Norah’s podcast, click on here.

Visual design and growth by: LA Johnson
Audio story produced by: Janet Woojeong Lee & Lauren Migaki
Audio and digital story edited by: Steve Drummond