Holly Carter is an amazing Founder and Executive Director of BYkids, a non-profit organization. She began her career as a writer and editor at The New York Times where she was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. She was awarded a Henry Luce scholarship and moved to South Korea where she reported for Sisa Weekly Magazine. Astonishing Holly, also produced the critically acclaimed documentary Margaret Sanger, co-found North Carolina’s Full Frame Film Festival, produce the PBS series Media Matters, and serve as the Executive Director of the Global Film Initiative before ultimately founding BYkids.
Luximagazine is extremely glad for getting opportunity to interview wonderful personality Ms. Holly Carter. In this article, Luximagazine will discuss about her and her organisation.
• On what type of social problems do you work? Why do you think they are important?
BYkids produces inspiring youth-created documentaries about pressing global issues as catalysts for empathy, education and change.
We identify universal themes and then pair renowned filmmakers with young storytellers who humanize important topics through their own stories— making them accessible, relevant and actionable.
These films and their educational material ignite important conversation and inspire a new generation of change makers.
Partnering with public television and education innovators, we distribute the films and support materials for in-class and at-home learning. This provides a broad platform for cross-cultural understanding and empathetic engagement.
Our films and support materials reach over 200 million people through public television broadcasts, educational partnerships (Discovery Education and PBS Learning), social media outreach, and in-person and virtual events.
By sharing unique stories from different parts of the world, we create the space for American youth to contextualize issues from the experiences of their global peers.
Our educational tools ignite personal story sharing and catalyze a new kind of civic engagement.
Themes cover a wide range of global topics, such as tolerance, anti-hate, climate change, education access, gun violence, racial equity, Indigenous rights, gender equity, immigration, juvenile justice, civic engagement, refugee crises, human rights and more.
We are building a new ecosystem that engages youth and educators in a totally different way. To support kids as they try and find their voice in the world, we are launching a national initiative that helps students grow and learn from each other. BYkids films are used as catalysts for community building, collaborative story sharing, critical thinking and peer-generated civic engagement.
• How did you become involved in this type of work? What inspired you to continue working for social change?
As a journalist I saw colonial journalism. As a parent, I saw rote learning and patronizing philanthropy. It occurred to me that kids are the best journalist – they see the truth and report that without ego or politics. I also love the power of storytelling to connect people and a world where moving image was the new language that kids used to express themselves and learn about the world around them. Kids are also able to see problems clearly and often come up with simple solutions. I wanted to give them the power to tell their own stories and serve as models as social change agents.
• How long have you been involved in this work?
I was a print journalist at The New York Times in my early career and have been passionate about social justice issues since I was a kid. I got really angry after 9/11 to see how fear divided us and in a big city like New York, how we othered people when it used to be the magnificent fabric of our every day. That inspired the idea of BYkids to change the way we teach our kids so they can learn to listen, appreciate other cultures and find / use their own voice to make the world a better place.
• What are some of the problems you face in your work?
Funding is the hardest part of making our films and building an international brand so teachers know about our films and educational resources. We offer our films and educational material for free at www.bykids.org, but we want teachers to come to us.
