AwesomeStPaul is proud to announce our December $1,000 grant to the Face to Face Academy Podcast. The weekly podcast features high school students talking about what's important to them. This project helps to build community among high school students, which is one of our chapter's core values. Check out the podcast on their website.

In the words of Teacher Jennifer Plum, "The Face to Face Podcast Network is a collection of uncensored and unfiltered student voices processing this unprecedented moment in time. Parents, teachers, government officials, doctors, social workers, sociologists, and historians all wonder and question how the youth of today are coping with all the societal changes of the last few years. How is the pandemic affecting the youth? How is the mental health of young people today? What are young people going to take away from their educational experience? How are they still managing to find joy in being a teenager? Sometimes heartbreaking, often humorous, and always inspiring, the "F2FPN" begins to provide answers with a new episode dropping EVERY TUESDAY.

The Face to Face Podcast Network places the microphones in the hands of youth and dares to consider: “What happens when high school students decide the topics, ask the questions, tell their stories, and find their voices?”

We started the podcast in Spring 2022 and recently published our 26th episode. It has been an essential community-building tool to get students listening and speaking again in a post-covid environment. Listenership now approaches 1,000 downloads. Students pick their own topics, form their own questions, and invite other guests on the mic. Guests mainly involve other students, but some episodes feature teachers, school social workers, cousins, parents, or former students. All music featured on the episodes is recorded in-house as well in our music class. Students are recorded by a contracted staff member and supported with related curriculum by the Language Arts Department. Each episode published online through "simplecast.com" and is available on all major listening platforms. In our research, there are no high schools in Minnesota producing a school-led weekly podcast"