MTSU Mondays: Camp boosts youth media literacy; state housing report mixed

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Middle Tennessee State University’s College of Media and Entertainment recently boosted the media literacy of area youth by hosting the “Come to Voice” summer camp program for seventh to ninth graders from the Boys and Girls Clubs of Rutherford County.

Journalism professors Jennifer Woodard and Ken Blake have facilitated the digital literacy camp that has empowered area youth to use their voices through hands-on experience in digital media.

“Partnering with the Boys and Girls Clubs lets us engage with kids in these demographic groups and inspire them to work toward getting into college and, we hope, majoring in a media-related field,” said Ken Blake, a professor in the School of Journalism and Strategic Media.

“We want to help these kids realize the value of what they have to say and develop voices to say it publicly and powerfully. That's what it means to “Come to Voice.’”

This summer, 20 students got an overview of several media areas, including data and broadcast journalism, advertising and public relations. Each segment was taught by different journalism faculty.

Lauren Cobb, a rising eighth grader, said she enjoyed creating the Google survey and hearing the different opinions.

“You get to see how other people think because not everyone thinks the same,” said Cobb.

Trevor Johnson, a counselor for the Boys and Girls Clubs for seven years, said, “It’s been great to see our kids learn different ways to content-create and be safe while doing it.”

Multiple activities were planned throughout the week, including a tour of the XR studio inside the Bragg Media and Entertainment Building, a visit to the MakerSpace inside the James E. Walker Library, and lunch in McCallie Dining Hall.

Participants also enjoyed a road trip to Nashville to tour the WTVF-TV NewsChannel5 studios, where they met meteorologist Leland Statom and went behind the scenes of a live segment of the famous “Talk of the Town” cooking show.

New to the camp this year, students visited the College of Education to learn ways to use their voice through education.

Woodard, also assistant dean of the College of Media and Entertainment, said the goal is to extend the program to other academic colleges within the university to encourage students to pursue a college education.

“We want to open this (Come to Voice) to the other eight colleges on campus,” said Woodard. “We plan to continue to provide our week plus offer a week for all the other colleges in hopes that the students will discover something that makes the dream of college a reality.”

Woodard's 12-year-old son, Kaden Woodard, has participated in the camp since it began. He said his favorite experience this year was the trip to NewsChannel5.

"I learned that it's possible to make robotic cameras that move for you, but humans are still more accurate with getting crazy camera angles," said Kaden. "No matter how much machines try to compete, humans will always be better.”

Report: Tenn. home prices remain strong; closings, inventory up across state

MTSU’s latest “Housing Tennessee” report shows annual improvements in home prices, single-family permits and other areas bolstered by a growing workforce, but also showed areas of mixed results such as multifamily permit decreases.

“Tennessee's housing market presented a mixed landscape for the first quarter of the year,” said Murat Arik, director of the MTSU Business and Economic Research Center and author of its statewide report for the first quarter of 2024.

“While employment and home prices showed notable increases, challenges such as declines in specific sectors and mortgage tax collections persisted,” Arik noted.

“Resilience in single-family home construction is encouraging, but rising mortgage delinquencies and homeowner vacancy rates raise concerns. Moving forward, close monitoring of these trends is essential to ensure stability and growth in Tennessee's housing market.”

Some report highlights include:

• Single-family permits in Tennessee were up annually (24%) but was down slightly (2.35%) quarterly. Meanwhile, multifamily permits were down for the state, the South and the U.S., both annually and quarterly.

• Home prices continued rising for all Tennessee Metropolitan Statistical Areas, or MSAs, with the Cleveland MSA leading with a 14.6% increase.

• Home closings increased across all regions: Quarterly, Memphis led at 8.6%, followed by Nashville at 7.6%, and Knoxville at 4%. Annually, only Memphis saw an increase (8.65%), while Nashville and Knoxville experienced declines.

See the full report and more detailed breakdowns at https://www.mtsu.edu/berc/housing/. BERC’s report is funded by Tennessee Housing Development Agency.

MTSU Mondays content is provided by submissions from MTSU News and Media Relations.

This article originally appeared on Murfreesboro Daily News Journal: Camp boosts youth media literacy; state housing report mixed