581 Hello and Happy New Year! Emma Nolan-Abrahamian sent this and I thought I would pass it on in case any one has some old equipment that could help these kids. Thanks, Ami I work for a non-profit called Critical Exposure (www.criticalexposure.org). Critical Exposure's mission is to teach students to use documentary photography and their own voices to become effective advocates for school reform and social change. Since our founding in 2004, Critical Exposure has worked with more than 450 students in DC and across the country. Past projects have focused on school facilities, teen pregnancy and youth homelessness. Currently, we are working on a project that addresses DC's dropout/pushout crisis. To this end, we have partnered with the DC Alliance of Youth Advocates to create a network called S.T.E.P. Up DC to address graduation rates in the district. Currently, Critical Exposure students use both point and shoot film cameras and point and shoot digital cameras. These are, on a basic level, adequate for our purposes, and have let our students document certain issues, like teen pregnancy, the drop out issue, and school facilities, extremely effectively. Given the limited arts budgets of DC public schools, the most cost-effective approach to teaching photography has been very basic digital point and shoots (at this point, unfortunately, learning photography with film and darkrooms is beyond the budget or capability of the public school system). But, we would also like our students to learn the basics of photography. Beyond lighting, composition and point of view, we would like our students to learn to manually use a camera--shutter speed, f-stops, etc. Here's why I'm emailing you. Critical Exposure is looking for camera donations, specifically of digital SLRs. Now, we're not looking for a Canon 5D Mark II or a D3. And I'm not asking you for equipment--the newspaper industry and photographers, I know, have been especially hard hit by the state of the economy. Basically, at some point in the nearish future, we would love to have a digital SLR with the option of manual settings so that some of our advanced students can really learn how to use a camera. That said, if you're interested in helping CE, here's what you can: -if you have friends or family members who are thinking about selling their old digital equipment, suggest a tax deductible donation to Critical Exposure instead. -If you work at a newspaper whose older equipment is gathering dust in the back of a cabinet, think about who could be using those cameras next. -If you know someone at a camera company who may be able to help us out, we're always looking for new contacts. You can contact her here: Emma Nolan-Abrahamian VISTA Fellow Critical Exposure 1816 12th St. NW, 3rd Floor Washington, DC 20009 202-745-3745 x20 www.criticalexposure.org emma@criticalexposure.org . 2 2009-01-08T18:40:51Z 0 2009-01-08T18:40:51Z true 25868 false 14830 2009-01-13T12:31:19Z washington, dc true 2009-07-08T00:00:00Z false camera-donations 1 2009-01-13T12:31:27Z 3853