Overview

s’Cool is a thirty minute current events television programme written and hosted by students in various schools across the province of Quebec. Each programme is divided into live recordings from a host school and produced features from other schools. The show has a professional production crew that shoots, edits and readies the show for broadcast. s’Cool is also streamed on the LEARN website. In 2007-2008, 16 episodes aired on Montreal’s CTV network every second Sunday at 11:30AM. The show is aimed at Secondary 4 and 5 students (Secondary Cycle 2, Yr 2-3).

Objectives What do we hope to get out of this project? We want to provide opportunities for teachers and students to be involved in real-life meaning-making through media; b) to link various schools and students around a common project; c) to make use of the produced shows in classrooms across the province. Future goals include adapting the s’Cool experience to schools not involved in the broadcast project.	Vision What principles guide this project? s’Cool is about building capacity, camaraderie and community in and between schools by engaging students in their world on their terms. The main tenet of the s’Cool programme is ‘About students, for students, by students’. While a professional crew may handle the production aspects, the content of the show, including its ideas and message, is the students’ own.
Format How does it work? Each episode of s’Cool is divided into a hosted portion and a features portion. For both portions, participating schools submit scripts and storyboards to the show’s producers. In each school, student groups work on a series of 3-minute features: the idea, the outline, the rough storyboard and the script. The production crew comes in to tape one feature per day in the school or in the community. The crew also takes care of any additional footage that may be needed to produce the feature as well as the editing of the feature. Each school is responsible for the scripts for at least 2 features in total. In addition to the features, each school hosts one of the episodes of the show in their school or in their community. Students research, prepare and script items around issues that they have identified as important to them and other young people.	Participants Who participates in s’Cool? s’Cool is made possible by participation from schools from every English school board in the province of Québec. Students from these schools along with their teachers participate in the making of the show. Ideally, a teacher can involve her whole class in the project and other teachers can take part as well (see Curriculum Fit section). In 2007-2008, 15 schools took part in the making of 16 thirty-minute shows. Target Audience Who watches s’Cool? The show is aimed at Secondary 4 and 5 students (Secondary Cycle 2, Yr 2-3). This makes it also desirable to younger students at the secondary level. Of course, parents and educators find it interesting as well.