jamCAMP On Women-Owned Businesses in White River Junction
jamCAMP On Women-Owned Businesses in White River Junction
Where do you go if you’re a kid, or you have a kid, who wants to learn how to report a story, work with a green screen, or shoot and edit a film? You head to one of CATV’s jamCAMPs.
During this summer of 2022, CATV has offered Media Arts programs for young people in Studio Production (“can’t tell a gimbal from a gobo?”), Music Video Production, Breaking News—Multimedia Journalism, and Animation. (Another jamCAMP, Martial Arts Movie Making, begins on July 25.) In the Multimedia Journalism camp, participants are able to meet with professional journalists such as Maggie Cassidy (Managing Deputy Editor at VT Digger), Jim Kenyon (Columnist at The Valley News), Will Parsons (CNBC Segment Producer), Elizabeth Wilcox (Freelance journalist), and Rob Gurwitt (publisher of Daybreak).
Multimedia Journalism campers Ollie Hanna, Annie Hanna, and AJ Fredland produced a short film about women-owned businesses and the economic rebirth of White River Junction. (Video, top). White River is awash in female entrepreneurs including those who have been there from the beginning, or close to: Sally Wright Bacon of Oodles, Eileen McGuckin of the former Tip Top Cafe, now Thyme Restaurant, and Kim Souza of Revolution. In their film, campers focus on Souza and the owners of Flourish, JUEL, and Gear Again.
Does gender make a difference? Souza cites a sense of collaboration and community-building and speaks to the camera: “I don’t think any of us are just only focused on the bottom line.” Elena Taylor, the “EL” in JUEL, notes the comfort of “shared stories, successes, and hardships.” But challenges remain. Bridget Cushman of Gear Again says that overcoming stereotypes remains difficult. Despite being an owner of a sporting equipment store, Cushman observes: “People don’t look to me for advice. They find a dad helping a kid putting on his skates and they’ll ask that person.”
(With thanks to Samantha Davidson Green for her help with this post.)
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Susan B. Apel shuttered a lifelong career as a law professor to continue an interest (since kindergarten) in writing. Her freelance business, The Next Word, includes literary and feature writing; her work has appeared in a variety of lit mags and other publications including Art New England, The Woven Tale Press, The Arts Fuse, and Persimmon Tree. She connects with her neighbors through Artful, her blog about arts and culture in the Upper Valley. She’s in love with the written word.