Street Kids Gain Access to New Media While Mayor Gregor Robertson and EA Sports Cut the Ribbon on New Opportunities
Photo by Trish Meow trishmeow.com
On Wednesday, January 13th, Mayor Gregor Robertson cut the ribbon on the new media room at Directions Youth Services, funded by EA Sports, an award winning developer of sports video games including Madden, FIFA, EA SPORTS Active, Tiger Woods PGA TOUR, NBA LIVE, NHL, Grand Slam Tennis, Fight Night.
After the ribbon cutting, the crowd was entertained by youth playing folk music and blues.
Directions Youth Services provides a safe place to run to. It is the only 24-hour, multi-service centre in Vancouver that provides young people at loose ends access to laundry, food, jobs, education, housing and community.
The kids hanging out at Directions all have different stories to tell. Some ran away from home and some had no home to run away from. The centre's facility provides opportunities for young people to tell, illustrate and publish their stories and connect with others through music, art, filmmaking, computer literacy, social media and video games.
The décor of the room is rich with color. The walls are painted with sci-fi murals involving a flawlessly painted robotic octopus. At the opening, all of the tables in the room had stacks of the zine produced by Directions youth called, “Another Slice.”
It is exciting to see the expanse of new media reach between socio-economic divides. The kids at Directions will now have the opportunity to get equipped with high tech skills that are valuable to the open source era that we currently occupy.
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