2 events showcase teens, tech

People tend to have a bit of fatigue with today’s technology and its impact on kids.

“I can only talk to my kids via texting” is a common theme these days.

But some of us have a lot of smiles this weekend after watching The Vindicator showcase area high-schoolers engaging technology in momentous ways.

The Buckeye Regional Robotics Championship took place last weekend in Cleveland, and of the 56 teams entered, Girard High School’s RoboCats captured the gold medal. They and partner Austintown Fitch Falco-Tech thus will compete at the World Championships in St. Louis next month.

Two other Mahoning Valley teams — Hubbard’s Sonic Screwdrivers and Warren G. Harding’s Delphi E.L.I.T.E. — also qualified.

Amid celebrating them Monday, the technology switched to video cameras as Girard, Fitch, Warren and South Range competed in the finals of our first High School Music Video Challenge presented by Covelli Centre and Packard Music Hall.

Thursday night, many of us smiled from the floor of Packard as local musicians JD Eicher and the Goodnights brought the event to a triumphant close.

In talking about the video event, Packard host Eric Ryan summed up the specialness of both the robotics and the video events:

We seem to fixate on our high-school performances based on touchdowns and three-pointers.

But there is a majority of high-schoolers thriving in activities away from the various ball tossings.

This week brought those kids some light.

If you have not caught our video contest, please go to vindy.com/schoolvideo to check out all the student efforts.

This was our first year doing this. We’re planning on it not being our last.

At the start, 22 schools signed up; just 12 were able to complete the tough assignment, which was:

We wanted to see how local students would do producing a music video to the same song. We modeled our venture after the massive “lip dub” culture that you can find on YouTube.

One fan of the project was Ed O’Neill, who took time last week to watch the final four videos.

Over four weeks, eight judges and public voting combined to whittle the 12 schools down to the final four. On Thursday, Warren Harding was crowned the winner after an online voting duel with Girard. Those two schools had people across America and even people overseas voting for them. They traded leads for two days, both generating 5,000+ votes in one day.

Documentary filmmaker Eric Murphy, fresh off his launch of the film “Traficant: The Congressman of Crimetown,” was a judge. Of Warren’s video he said:

“Overall, they were the most creative and entertaining. There was some really wonderful camera work, great use of stop motion and some cool tricks.”

Said Murphy of the Girard work:

“Very sophisticated work; well edited. There’s a future filmmaker at work on this one.”

South Range took third with a great vision from senior Rachel Sobota. Her video used the legendary “single-shot” technique. The whole school was organized and choreographed for a four-minute nonstop shot. It is a special feat.

Said Judge Katie Seminara of Youngstown Phantoms hockey:

“I can appreciate what [South Range] tried to do with this video. It was great to see them include all the different groups and teams in the video. I felt like I met every student in the school.”

For winning, Warren will be featured in an anti-bullying TV ad campaign we will build with our cousins over at 21 WFMJ-TV.

The school also gets a full show from JD Eicher and the Goodnights.

It was a special feeling Thursday night to watch the kids from the various schools standing front-stage at Packard singing JD’s song word-for-word as if it were as classic a tune as “Don’t Stop Believin’” from Journey.

Showcasing talent in this way — from the students to JD — hopefully can allow some of them someday to be as prolific as “Don’t Stop Believin’” and Journey.

Todd Franko is editor of The Vindicator. He likes emails about stories and our newspaper. Email him at tfranko@vindy.com. He blogs, too, on vindy.com. Tweet him, too, at @tfranko.