New Story Series: Change Starts with Us

Where do you see a need for change? High School Insider presents our new story series “Change Starts with Us.”

We are calling on you to tell us about a critical issue and either feature someone that is making change to address it or offer your opinion and ideas for making the change you wish to see. The issue you choose to highlight can be as big and as broad as Parkland students fighting for gun control at the national level or as narrow and as personal as a friend who empowered you to make a change within yourself.

This initiative aims to emphasize youth voices and action by sharing stories of change in their communities. Today, more and more young people are taking issues into their own hands, and we hope to collect the stories of those trailblazing young people.

Click the banner to see the Change Starts with Us stories that students are already sharing from around the country.  What is a story series?

HS Insider has posted over 6,000 student stories since it was first launched. These stories range from “The dangers of Hot Cheetos” to “#TeensToo experience sexual harassment.” We take pride in sharing stories on a breadth of topics but we also believe that we can create rich, nuanced stories by rallying diverse voices to contribute to one topic.

So, we created the annual content initiative. Our student leaders choose a topic that anyone can contribute to and then work with each contributor one-on-one to tell their story.

With the 2018 content initiative, Change Starts with Us, we believe that together, we can all recognize the trailblazers among us and highlight issues that deserve greater focus and awareness.

Tips:

Focus on one key issue and one individual or group. This issue should hold significance for you and you should also be able to explain its relevance to others. You may offer your opinion by writing from a first person point of view or you may write a profile of somebody else.

We can support you in your writing. If you know what you want to write, send us a full draft of your story. If you have an idea but aren’t sure where to start, send us your idea/an outline/a pitch and we can help you craft your story from there.

The final product can take whatever shape or form you’d like. Send us your stories, your poems, your videos. Use whatever medium you believe will tell your story best.

Next steps:

1. Submit your draft or idea through the Google form below.

1. Once you submit, a HS Insider student leader will contact you over email or text message with feedback.

Once your piece is complete, a student leader will help post your piece on the HS Insider website and send you a link to it once published.

Thank you for your participation in Change Starts with Us. We look forward to working with you!