The Capital Times
Madison’s Simpson Street Free Press, the newspaper written and produced by young people for other young people, was recognized Thursday in a White House ceremony as one of the country’s best youth programs.
The paper, which was founded in 1992 to help struggling students on the south side of Madison improve their writing and academic skills, received the 2008 “Coming Up Taller” award, an initiative of the President’s Committee on the Arts and the Humanities that is designed to recognize the nation’s best and most innovative youth programs.
The national honor is one of several awards the paper has earned in recent years for its effective methods of engaging and building the skills of young people.
The Free Press’ first headquarters was a makeshift community center in the old Simpson Street apartments on the city’s southeast side and involved just a handful of students. It now has its office and newsroom in nearby South Towne Mall and has a staff of nearly 40 student reporters who come from diverse backgrounds and neighborhoods. Young people apply for jobs at the paper and, once hired, meet assignment deadlines and attendance and school performance guidelines while they produce regular issues of the newspaper.
The staff, which ranges in age from 11 to 18, writes and produces the content of the Free Press. They research and produce articles on history, geography, science, literary criticism and the arts. Some write sports stories, and others write regular columns. The young reporters all work in an authentic newsroom environment. They write and rewrite articles several times before they are accepted for publication.
The paper is circulated at numerous outlets in the Madison area, including in all city schools. The Free Press provides lesson plans to teachers who want to use the paper in their classroom. Currently about 23,000 copies of each issue are printed. Subscription information is available online.