This edition of The Bridge was created by 15 middle and high school students from Aliquippa Impact, a nonprofit, youth development organization serving the young people and families of Aliquippa.
We asked the students to create content for their ideal newspaper that reflects aspects of their community — with The Bridge as the platform. They decided on sports, entertainment and community for the three sections. Creating content that could fit into those categories, the students could choose to either write an essay, take photos or draw, or talk in a podcast.
Here's what the students came up with!
Dani Brown
By Ranii Anderson, Samuel Cobb, Dathan Jackson and Da’on Lovett
Drawing by Mikayla Jones, 8th grade
By Devyn Arnold, Jordan Coleman, Issiah Genes, Izzy Genes, Emmori McKenzie and Jahieem Mitchell. Facilitated by Seth Whitted of Whitted Media.
Click the YouTube links below to watch two podcasts created by six students from Aliquippa. The students discuss why youth smoke, the Aliquippa School District's new drug testing policy, the best barbers and hairstylists in Aliquippa, and more.
By Breahna Diamond, Syniah Miller and Khy Redd
Basketball is my favorite sport
By Khy Redd
Age 13, 7th grade
My name is Khy Redd and I play sports.
These are my reasons:
Sports are good for you in a lot of ways physically. Playing sports keep your body strong. It improves your heart health, builds muscle and increases endurance. Sports help you stay in shape, build strength and keep your heart healthy.
The sport I like to play is basketball. It calms me down and it's fun to play with other friends. The basketball courts I like the best in Aliquippa are Linmar and Plan 12 courts.
More than ball players
By Syniah Miller
Age 15, 9th grade
My name is Syniah Miller, and I'm trying to persuade people to help kids my age get an opportunity and have open minds about all the possible things they might want to pursue in their life.
Kids like me try to find something they actually like or want to take an interest in. I'm into fashion. There are a lot of programs for guitar, drama and computer club. But kids like me who want to pursue fashion, nursing, construction and ingenuity, how do we even start off being an entrepreneur?
My main focus is finding something communal; something that will make change of the violence because the more kids that are interested in after-school programs, it keeps youth busy.
Sports is what Quip is known for, but let’s take a chance and let fashion be the reason somebody makes it out into the world to be something amazing and inspiring to others. Maybe others want an opportunity to make a change and have a bigger and brighter future.
And, who knows, maybe Syniah Miller will leave Quip being known as a fashion designer and not a ball player.
Aliquippa's fascinating history
By Breahna Williams
Age 14, 9th grade
Aliquippa, Pa. was in founded in 1894 and incorporated in 1900.
It's a Beaver County city along the Ohio River and it transformed from a small rural settlement into a major "company town" driven by Jones and Laughlin Steel (J&L Steel) Company, calling it Aliquippa Works. The city thrived with a population over 27,000 in 1940 but suffered economic decline after the mill closed in 1984.
Despite the association with Queen Aliquippa, the name was chosen by the Pittsburgh and Lake Erie Railroad in 1878 for a station and amusement park.
The collapse of the American Steel Industry led to the closure of most of the J&L plant in 1984.
Today, Aliquippa is known for its strong community, blue-collar pride and history of athletic excellence despite having faced substantial economic challenges.
Thank you to the staff at Aliquippa Impact for making this collaboration possible, as well as to Seth Whitted who set-up and facilitated the students' podcast and the Reynolds Journalism Institute (RJI) for funding this project.
And a huge thank you to the incredibly insightful, creative and kind students at Aliquippa Impact who created content for this edition — we are grateful to know you and work alongside you!
The Bridge is a community publication by RiverWise that creates, platforms and curates stories about our neighbors in Beaver County. The Bridge is working to become a hub for all things community: a platform for creative advocacy, a bulletin board for resources and opportunities and a space where the people of Beaver County are seen, inspired and motivated to work together.
Community Author
Community authors include dozens of Beaver County residents who have submitted their creative content to The Bridge.
Beaver County, Pa