Teacher makes a difference with WMSN

Last week, the inaugural episode for WMSN aired at Wasilla Middle School. The four-minute broadcast, created entirely by students in Andy Dwyer’s second hour media skills class, reported the weekly bulletin. As I listened to the program, as impressed as I was by the student’s presentation, I was reminded that a school’s most prized resource isn’t a program. It is the teacher.

“We think that the kids will be more likely to listen to the announcements through video rather than over the intercom,” Dwyer said. By the end of the quarter, Dwyer plans for WMSN to become a daily morning show for the school. He is confident the weekly WMSN broadcast in classrooms and on the mounted monitors in the hallways will have a positive effect in the school.

WMSN’s “maiden voyage” began with a quick introduction from Station Manager Dwyer and the “Pledge of Allegiance” led by Lexi Mufale. The broadcast featured news on the upcoming student council lollipop sale, NJHS’s Thanksgiving food drive and directions on how to receive WMS Spirit Days text messages. Excepting for the entertaining animated reading incentive commercial created by school librarian Carrie Day, the students did everything, from set building to editing in Final Cut. KTUU would do well to introduce their news with correspondents as articulate as eighth-graders Shyanne Massie and Preston Marks.

Two years ago, Dwyer, a seventh-grade geography teacher at Wasilla Middle School, accepted the challenge of creating and teaching a media skills exploratory class.

“They asked me the first week of school if I would be interested in teaching media to the kids,” he said. “They needed another exploratory class to fill the schedule. I said OK, and I started teaching it the next day. We didn’t have cameras until March.”

Dwyer used his own camera to guide that first class of 20 seventh- and eighth-graders through the creative process. The class’s first production, “The Enemy” — a first-class “Twilight Zone”-esque rendition of “The Monsters on Maple Street” — quieted any doubts about the Dwyer’s expertise. Considering Dwyer’s background, no one should have been surprised.

A Chugiak High graduate, Dwyer started in the communications industry as a disc jockey for KOOL 97.3.

“I have always been fascinated with pop culture, I guess,” he said.

Dwyer graduated in 2002 from Portland State University with a degree in Social Science.

“I always wanted to make movies and I figured a degree in Social Science would give me topics to say something with instead of just making movies about making movies,” he said. “You know, movies focused more about the world in general.”

During college he worked for a marketing research company that capitalized on his amateur cartooning and graphic artist talents. After returning to Alaska, he worked for Channel 11 and “Heartbeat Alaska” as a cameraman. It wasn’t long, though, when he turned to teaching and earned his master’s degree in teaching at UAA.

“I wanted to make films that would affect society and speak out, change people’s thoughts and cause them to think,” he said. “So I asked myself, how can I affect change without making movies? I considered being a cop when the teaching idea came up. I thought teaching would be a good way to make a difference. You know, 30 kids at a time. Or 34. Whatever.”

The popularity of Dwyer’s media skills class has grown from one multi-grade class period to three class sections. Dwyer teaches one seventh-grade class with 30 students in a general media skills course; the more advanced eighth-grade section writes and produces WMSN. Science teacher Danielle Chyko also teaches a third section of media skills as an eighth-grade exploratory class.

Dwyer has tried all sorts of ideas to have as many kids as possible work the camera in the making of a story. Last year, he even tried allowing the use of cellphones to video.

“That didn’t work out so well,” he said. “We have three cameras right now. We have two other donated cameras that work with tape. When I get them figured out we will have five cameras.

“It is important to show off what you made,” Dwyer added. WMSN is one way to do that, and the class’s Facebook page is another. “We made the WMS Productions Facebook and a YouTube account last year. It is a good way to share what the kids have done, as long you are careful with confidentiality and respect the student’s right to publish.”

Last year’s production “Wasilla Middle School’s Harlem Shake” is the site’s most popular video.

Dwyer’s end goal of his media skills creation is that the students end up with a greater overall appreciation of the team skills needed to complete a production.

“I want them to realize all of the strings needed to make it work,” he said.

WMSN’s polished quality proves what kids can accomplish when allowed to color outside the lines and are pushed to behave like professionals. Moreover, it testifies to what can happen when teachers are allowed to work personal talents into a curriculum all their own. With nothing more than a script, a hand-held camera, enough creative genius to be called talented and a sense of humor, Dwyer makes a difference.

“I don’t know what I’d do if I wasn’t a teacher,” Dwyer said. “It’s fresh every day.”

Emily Forstner teaches Language Arts at Wasilla Middle School.