From Award-winning youth radio stations to online community mural projects, strives to create a new paradigm among the nonprofit sector, the Hip Hop community, private industry and activists vis-a-vis how they think about social justice issues and how they might better work together.
Find out how ZeroDivide has used Hip Hop to educate, inspire and transform communities.
The Bay Area Video Coalition, or BAVC ("bay-vac"), was launched in 1976 as a way to make emerging video technology accessible to independent film makers. Today, with that mission still at its core, BAVC has evolved into a community media arts resource center.
BAVC seeks to place youth at the center of the changing media landscape -- to recognize them not merely as consumers of media, but to engage them as producers and innovators.
The organization identified the absence of a collective and intentional site for the Hip Hop community to co-exist and learn from another. BAVC sought to aggregate current and future curriculum, best practices, resources, tools and applications.
ZeroDivide awarded BAVC with a $50,000 grant to create Onthe1.org. This sophisticated, online resource will provide technological, production and promotional resources to young Hip hop artists.
Unlike other websites, Onthe1.org will act as a free community portal that links all aspects of Hip Hop digital culture. The site will utilize Web 2.0 technologies to provide a creative space where Hip Hop producers, performers and enthusiasts can communicate and network.
The site is scheduled to launch in spring 2007.
Onthe1.org will focus on arts education, literacy, youth development and the transformative nature of music production and performance. Innovative youth will utilize the space to combine technology, Hip Hop, learning and product.
Horizons Unlimited creates online collaboration, talent contest to expand students’ technology skills
Horizons Unlimited is a youth development and empowerment organization rooted in community service and advocacy. The DJ Project, a youth focused venture of Horizons Unlimited, is an arts and entrepreneurship youth program grounded in Hip Hop culture. The DJ Project brings culturally relevant educational and technology training opportunities to San Francisco Bay Area youth.
The DJ Project sought to involve youth from different parts of the bay area through online collaboration. In addition, the DJ Project wanted to create a competition to strengthen the artistic and professional development of participants
In 2004, ZeroDivide awarded The DJ Project with a $50,000 grant to develop a program that allowed youth from different parts of the Bay Area to create and market music online.
In 2006, ZeroDivide provided The DJ Project with another $50,000 grant to produce a youth run Hip hop arts competition: Grind and Glory. The contest was a collaboration between the DJ Project, the Bay Area Video Coalition and Youth Sounds. Based on the “American Idol” format, contestants competed for slots to participate in The DJ Project. Once selected, the winners were required to attend monthly professional development workshops in production or performance.
Hundreds of Bay Area youth engaged in the project and the competition. Participants collaborated in small teams and worked virtually to produce numerous CDs. The hands-on experience of collectively producing a competition helped the young people enhance their skills in technology, professional development and positive self-presentation.
Participants in The DJ Project showed improvements in the following areas:
From this event, Uth TV created a full length pro-bono documentary that was submitted to the Sundance Film Festival.
With Hip Hop curriculum, Just Think teaches students technology and digital communication skills
Just Think teaches young people to lead healthy, responsible and independent lives in a culture highly impacted by media. Founded in 1995 as a response to the ever-increasing deluge of messages youth received from popular media, Just Think has successfully created and delivered media arts and technology education locally, nationally and internationally. Just Think’s programs have reached nearly 7,000 students, teachers and parents.
Just Think envisioned a curriculum that enabled students to:
ZeroDivide funded $25,000 toward Flipping the Script, a collaborative project between Just Think, Bayview Hunters Point Center for Arts and Technology and Thurgood Marshall High School. Flipping the Script meets California teaching standards in English, History, and Social Science and includes:
In 2005, 100% of BAYCAT participants graduated and are now pursuing higher education. Flipping the Script has expanded Baycat’s successful after-school training programs. Using Hip-Hop as a focus for their own media projects, students create poetry, raps, CDs, videos, websites and digital artwork. This work fosters arts and technology career-building skills, including interview techniques, digital still and video photography, audio-recording, story-boarding and digital editing.
The curriculum also teaches students how to showcase their own media projects through school fairs, community exhibitions, film festivals, the Internet, and other forums. Audiences see Hip Hop through the eyes of the youth who develop, design and produce original works.
Pasadena City College and Bakari Kitwana increase “town hall” audience via Web 2.0 technology
Pasadena City College, in collaborations with Bakari Kitwana, created Rap Sessions, a national conversation on Hip Hop and Race. Rap Sessions is a multiracial panel of Hip Hop experts who tour California and the nation to engage youth in candid, compelling conversations about race, gender and power.
Rap Sessions sought to broaden the audience beyond event attendees.
Over a two-year period, ZeroDivide provided Rap Sessions with $50,000 in funding to:
Innovative after-school Hip hop program teaches technology skills, history and community outreach.
The Mural Art Project's mission is to educate, empower and inspire youth through the arts. Founded in 2001, the Mural Art Project offers youth development programs in East Palo Alto, Menlo Park, and Redwood City. The Mural Arts Project employs socio-economically disadvantaged teens to research, design and install large public art murals.
Through previous support from ZeroDivide, The Mural Arts Project created History though Hip Hop: a novel after-school music program that uses Hip Hop culture to teach History, English, and creative writing skills. The curriculum combines technology, community activism and Hip Hop to provide a stimulating and engaging learning environment.
The Mural Arts Project has served over 250 youth who have produced one CD; written, recorded and performed six original songs and created 17 murals – one for every school in the local district.
The Mural Arts Project strives to transform the perceptions of East Palo Alto as a place plagued by crime and violence to a vibrant community known for its innovative and community-inspired art and culture.
The Mural Arts Project sought to generate more interest in their inspirational art and projects within surrounding communities while deeply engaging youth in developing technology skills and entrepreneurship.
ZeroDivide provided The Mural Arts Project with a $50,000 grant to establish a dynamic virtual tour of the public art murals installed in East Palo Alto and East Menlo Park. This online showcase was designed to include imagery, narrative, and interactive audio and video communication elements.
Mural Arts Project worked with community leaders, members, and youth to research and develop a new digital mural concept for installation on a suitable public site.
The website, currently in beta stage, features interactive maps that identify public mural locations, 360? tours of murals, time laps videos, digital storytelling, original music and a voicethread feature that captures viewers’ audio commentaries. Students have developed skills in applications, programming, digital media production and online marketing.
The site is set to go live in Spring 2007.
Online social networking connects and empowers youth movements
Created in 1999, Movement Strategy Center actively supports movements that aim to increase youth and adult participation in social justice issues. Movement Strategy Center uses a variety of tools to achieve its objectives: collective visioning and mapping, formal and informal collaborations among organizations and joint strategies to develop stronger and more effective movements.
Youth, youth activists and youth organizations needed a web portal to work together more effectively to address issues of racial, economic, environmental and social justice.
ZeroDivide awarded $50,000 to Movement Strategy Center to create a web portal that:
Movement Strategy Center is finalizing development of mybloc.net, an online portal that introduces new and existing technology in user-friendly ways to help leaders and activists from around the country connect, engage and exchange information and ideas. The site is built on four key values: cultural relevance to youth and Hip Hop audiences, values driven, empowering young people and supporting face to face organizing.
Mobile Publishing Teams and Web Radio Project power next-generation broadcasters
Youth Radio is an award winning, nationally recognized leader in Youth Media content creation and distribution. Every year more than 400 low-income and youth of color participate in Youth Radio’s free, after school media training and broadcast journalism education.
Over a two-year period, ZeroDivide awarded Youth Radio $100,000 to:
Today, Youth Radio’s content reaches 22 million people annually through its multiple media outlets including National Public Radio (Latino USA, Morning Edition, All Things Considered) Public Radio International (Marketplace), CNN.com, CBSHealthWatch.com and the Pacifica News Service.