January 17, 2012

The Academy for Character Education at the Sage Colleges in Troy has recognized the student video, "How to Unmake a Bully," with a Champions of Character award.

The video will be recognized at the Champions of Character Awards Banquet at 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday, April 3, at Franklin Plaza in Troy.

A January 12 letter from the academy to Mike Feurstein, the Glendaal teacher aide who directed the video, said the academy believes that "much of character is taught, rather than being taught" and "it takes a village to raise a child." The letter goes on to say that "your leadership, positive actions and quest for excellence are a role model and attest to the influence you have in nurturing civility in our schools and positive character development in our community. Your efforts are very much appreciated."

Here's the letter from the Academy [MORE] PDF.

In addition to Feurstein, who makes films and shoots videos as a side career in his private life, teacher Marianne Reidy and social worker Cindy Skala coordinated the scripting and creation of the video. The project was developed by students in grades 4 and 5 throughout the 2010-11 school year. Students served as the cast and crew for the project. The video premiered in June 2011.

Student actors encounter bullies at school and are shown how best to deal with, or 'unmake,' them. The effort was part of a year-long character education program focusing on bullying.

The Daily Gazette also wrote an article about the project. [MORE].

Check out the trailer
Here is a short trailer from the video on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/user/Enzineph?feature=mhum#p/a/u/0/8c2AR62HRlc

Full length video

The full 27-minute video can be seen here on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?src_vid=8c2AR62HRlc&feature=iv&v=N0f6qQrvD8k&annotation_id=annotation_430612

To watch the video, you may need to have Adobe Flashplayer on your computer.

More about the Academy for Character Education

The Academy for Character Education was established in 2000 to help foster the character traits of responsibility, civility, respect, honesty, fairness, trustworthiness and citizenship in students throughout the educational spectrum as well as in families and communities. While its primary goal is to help school districts integrate the concepts of Character Education into their formal and informal curriculum, the Academy pursues a comprehensive approach to character development reaching out to all sectors of the larger community including the family, civic organizations, businesses, and government

The Academy, which operates within Sage's School of Education, provides training institutes, in-service days for teachers and staff, leadership training for students and specialized programs for other sectors of the community.