Your Support Could Change a Life

On Saturday, December 1, 2012 at 11:30 a.m. in Westminster College's Mueller Theater in the McKelvey Campus Center, three senior broadcast communications students are sharing their senior capstone documentaries with the campus and community.

Three short films will be presented including a documentary which looks into the journey of ten children who survived European orphanages and have found a home in Raleigh, NC. 

The other capstones in the series are Hannah Paczkowski's project titled "Personalizing Homelessness"  which takes an inside look at a woman who, with her daughter, fought the hardships of homelessness and found a better life in the Interfaith Hospitality Network.

Adam Carswell's film "The Quest of Champions" highlights the Westminster Mens' 2012 Track and Field season.

Service Learning and What in the World this Documentary has to do with it

My focus for my Capstone actually started with service learning.  My friend, Leah, met the Boyd's while she was on Spring Break with a purpose in Raleigh, NC.  She called me up, told me about the family and the rest is history.

My documentary focuses around International Adoption and life for the family after the children are adoption.  In relation to service learning, it raises awareness of the hardships orphans in Eastern Europe face in the orphanages.  The children start off in not so healthy environments: being chained to cribs and staying in them for so long it deforms their bodies...

                                           
                                           
The children hardly receive enough nutrients to sustain themselves and in many cases, never see outside of the orphanage grounds. 

 

After spending a week with the Boyd's, I connected with them on such a close level and I feel like I am helping them personally when I inform others of the befits of adoption, as well as the horrors which go on in some Eastern Europe orphanages.

Love is Patient, Love is Kind

At the start of my documentary, I will use the voices of the six oldest children reciting 1 Corinthians, "Love is patient, love is kind" etc. and putting videos of children in the orphanages of the country's where the Boyd children are from.  I think that using their hopeful voices with the startling videos of the children still in orphanages will have a strong emotional impact on the audience. 

For the music, I don't want to use music very much in my documentary.  I think that the natural sound and the interviews of those who know the Boyd's best will make for the best sound.  For the parts where music is necessary, I plan on developing my own music in Garage Band.  I want to use something uplifting and inspirational for the opening and closing.

Below is another video I might use, if it fits, regarding what happens to orphans in Russia if they are forced to live on the streets.