Setting sail for the sunny south: Durham College students to shoot educational video in Caribbean Posted on January 23, 2014 at 11:11 am. Oshawa, Ont. – Durham College, in partnership with the Association of Canadian Community Colleges (ACCC), is pleased to announce that School of Media, Art & Design (MAD) students Chris Gauvreau and Manjula Selvarajah, along with journalism Professor Danielle Harder, have been selected to travel to Jamaica and Antigua this January with another trip to follow in February to Guyana and Barbados to produce videos documenting the CARICOM Education for Employment (C-EFE) program, part of ACCC’s overall Education for Employment (EFE) initiative. C-EFE is a seven-year initiative funded by the Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development (DFATD), formerly known as CIDA. Gauvreau, Selvarajah and Harder will produce the videos as part of the C-EFE’s marketing strategy and materials. “We are incredibly proud of the strong depth of talent at Durham College,” said Fiona Richards, executive director, International Business Development. “Being able to utilize the talents of both our students and faculty in an international setting while providing Chris and Manjula with an opportunity to obtain real-world work experience while gaining exposure to other countries and cultures continues to enhance our reputation for providing experiential learning and bringing our mission ‘the student experience comes first’ to life.” The team will be filming and interviewing individuals working on several EFE projects currently underway in the Caribbean with a particular focus on how to engage industry in education/training while showcasing industry involvement in curriculum development. Through these partnerships, Canadian post-secondary schools can share their experience in educational programs tailored to local employers’ needs, while providing Canadian college students with learning opportunities abroad. Gauvreau, a second-year student in the Digital Video Production program, and Selvarajah, a third-year student in the Journalism – Print and Broadcast program, were chosen to participate by a panel of professors and Greg Murphy, dean of MAD, based on their portfolio presentations and interviews. “This is a phenomenal opportunity for us,” said Selvarajah. “It will give us a chance to take everything we have learned in our classrooms and studios and apply it in a real-life scenario. We plan to make our client happy with the pieces we produce and our college very proud.” While on location, students will record in the field on two separate locations, for roughly one week each, with the first shoot taking place in Jamaica and Antigua from Sunday, January 26 to Saturday, February 1 and the second in Guyana and Barbados from Wednesday, February 12 to Wednesday, February 19. Gauvreau and Selvarajah will then return to Durham College to edit their material and produce the final videos. “An opportunity like this is indescribable,” said Harder. “Students will not only get to showcase their exceptional breadth of media skills, they will also see first-hand the tremendous work done by DFATD, through implementing organizations like ACCC in developing countries.” In addition to what is taking place in the Caribbean, a team of MAD students based at the college will be co-ordinating and leading a one-hour live Riot radio show during each trip (two shows in total). The shows will feature interviews with Selvarajah and ACCC partners in the Caribbean. There will also be daily traveller blogs with short updates on how the team is doing on location. The students back in Canada will also be creating a website for the project that includes more details about the trip, blogs and samples of footage shot. The site will be updated regularly while the team is away so that people may follow their adventures. Some behind-the-scenes footage may also be posted to showcase the work involved in preparing for the trip. The C-EFE program aims to ensure a network of 150 Canadian colleges and institutes is able to continue contributing, in an effective and sustainable way, to poverty reduction in developing countries. This includes supporting private sector development through workforce training and micro-enterprise support in sectors of the economy where there is a lack of qualified workers and entrepreneurs. With recent studies on the education system in the Caribbean region showing that employers have difficulty in attracting and retaining a skilled, adaptable and flexible workforce, which they attribute to a lack of workforce preparedness, basic skills and an understanding of expected workplace behaviour and work ethics, the C-EFE program is designed to create a larger, more competitive and productive and gender-equitable workforce in the CARICOM region. C-EFE is working with 12 CARICOM countries: Antigua and Barbuda; the Bahamas; Barbados; Belize; Dominica; Grenada; Guyana; Haiti; Jamaica; Montserrat; Saint Lucia; St. Kitts and Nevis; St. Vincent and the Grenadines; Suriname; and Trinidad and Tobago. ACCC is the national and international voice of Canada’s publicly-funded colleges and institutes, with 1.5 million learners of all ages and backgrounds at campuses serving over 3,000 urban, rural and remote communities. For more information on ACCC and the C-EFE program, please visit the ACCC website. -30- About Durham College At Durham College, the student experience comes first. In September 2013, the college welcomed more than 30,000 students to campus including more than 10,000 full-time post-secondary and apprenticeship students as well as part-time and continuing education students and online learners. The college offers a wide range of market-driven programs in a number of different disciplines including culinary, hospitality, tourism, horticulture, business, information technology, media, art, design, general arts, science, skilled trades, justice, emergency services, health and engineering technology, enabling students to develop the skills required to meet the demands of today’s job market. A three-phase expansion of the college’s Whitby campus was recently completed when the 36,000-square-foot Centre for Food opened on the northwest corner of campus. Accommodating approximately 900 additional students studying in culinary, hospitality, tourism, agricultural and horticultural programs, it also features Bistro ’67, a new, 70-seat, full-service, green-certified teaching and learning restaurant and Pantry, a new retail store featuring fresh-baked items, meals-to-go, preserved foods and ready-to-cook meals created by students in the college’s culinary programs. For more information, visit www.durhamcollege.ca or call 905.721.2000. Media contact: Cosette Kazarian Communications and Marketing 905.721.2000 ext. 3611 cosette.kazarian@durhamcollege.ca SHARE:
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