Students Learn Striv; Learn Life
When a teacher can create a classroom and have the students view it as a business and conduct themselves accordingly; success can thrive. For James Reed, Tech Integration Specialist/Digital Media Teacher at Southern Valley, he has done just that and the results have been compelling. His ability to pull maturity, business sense and responsibility out of students ranging from seventh grade to senior is nothing short of inspirational. We’ll go deeper into how the SV EagleVision team of students is succeeding in the classroom and in life under the instruction of our StrivU featured teacher, James Reed.
Southern Valley emerged into integrating technology for the school a few years ago when they purchased a Daktronics Video Board for the gym and then adopted Striv as their live streaming and education platform. For Reed and Southern Valley, it seemed simple. They were serious about doing this the best way for the students and the school and they felt comfortable with putting a face with the support they would receive from Striv. They felt the priority they held with the Striv team and soon found out that Striv would let them know they were having issues while the issue was happening and work towards resolving it together. The good relationship and comfortability level allowed for Reed and the SV EagleVision team to be comfortable and settle in to become a very professional social media and streaming group. At that point, it was Reed who transformed his Modern Problems & Current Events class into a business-like new media and streaming atmosphere. He has been at the school for 16 years and was up for the challenge of taking the ideas and interested students to the next level.
This year, SV EagleVision has six students divided into two sections. These students have been guided by Reed since they first showed interest. He does everything from getting an idea where their responsibility level is to talking with parents so they, too, understand the commitment level involved. He doesn’t do this to seek out a genius; he does this to find passion and energy in students who he knows they can build on. From there, he teaches them streaming, he teaches them filming, commercial building and technical skills; he teaches them ownership, roles, and professionalism; he teaches them life. And this creates an incredible platform to build an ultra successful, well-run stream team to share a great schools great story to the masses.
As the students have grown into learning the ins and outs of sharing the Eagles story online and to the public, they have learned the gym’s big screen functionality, all the components of their live stream for events as well as Twitter and how to run the school’s account to not just cater to the students, but to thinking about it being shared with opposing schools, to grandparents unable to attend, to the missionaries watching in Haiti, the relatives in Germany and so on; many people across many regions and cultures. Reed gets them to understand that they have a broad audience and how to communicate effectively and appropriately to these diverse groups. In that, he is teaching them how to take a life skill that is great for their school in the present but also one they can carry into college; into their future careers and into life.
“Students get their eyes opened and see that this is a big deal.”
But it’s not just all serious faces and business in the classroom with Reed. “Striv is fun!” he comments as to why kids ask him to be in the class. They have a great time in talking about their own uniqueness as a community. They use this to have a little fun with their gym’s big screen. A unique community feature is raising goats and llamas, something not typical of most communities. They have some fun with this as they come up with witty ideas for halftime and timeouts on the big screen that gets a really good response. They also have created really great starting lineup images as they brought the players in, used a green screen and created interactive images as the starters are announced. Reed doesn’t stop sharpening his skills either. He met with the people of HuskerVision to bounce ideas off of, get ideas and grow in creativity. He is always learning better ways to ‘cater to the audience’ whether that be just the people in the gym during the game on the big screen or with streaming and on social media; free for the world to see. Reed gets it and gets his students to get it too.
The SV EagleVision team earns respect from their ‘CEO’ Reed by taking ownership, being leaders in the class and staying responsible with events and making sure they are covered to stream and share the story. From there, they get freedom to be innovative and create and communicate to their audience. SV EagleVision has a fully functioning staff that consists of:
James Reed, CEO of EagleVision
Ian Coffey, Vice President of Operations
Kylee Woodring, Director of Social Media
Kyauna Kring, Communications Officer
Pete Brown, Junior Voice of the Eagles
Taylor Russell, Executive Editor
Makayla Schoen, Corrections Officer
The class has fun taking on roles and embodying their titles. They joke and have a good time with Makayla’s ‘Corrections Officer’ title. She, a seventh grader, has the ability to find and correct errors before taking things live. A great skill and worthy of ‘Corrections Officer’ status coined by the team. Each student holds a specific title and carries out the task of that title. They each take all the responsibility it holds and complete it with the best of their ability. If they can’t attend an event; it is up to them to find their own replacement. This creates a way for the students to really embrace their role and treat it like a position someone would hold in a career setting. Great life skills. “In giving the kids more ownership, it makes my role a whole lot easier,” Reed states.
In all, the EagleVision team have great attitudes, rise to the challenge of leadership and responsibility and learn a lot about understanding your audience and effectively communicating with them. Because of all of this, they create a great viewing experience. Reed has shown them ways to be successful in his classroom and be successful in life. For SV EagleVision, it’s about enjoying what you’re doing and making it great for those you are serving. Very proud to call the SV EagleVision part of the Striv family! Keep sharing the Eagle story.
Interested in learning more about how your school can share their story with Striv? Go here.
Written by Jessica Siebert (StrivU Director)
