By Teens For Teens Reaches Teens
Posted by anastasia on 07-24-2006Great new research from the Newspaper Association of America Foundation on teen pages at local newspapers — I'm hoping this will revive some pages that have lost institutional support as well as launch some new ones. I still think they have to have a rich web and mobile presence in order to stay relevant, but this validates what youth media practitioners have always preached. From the press release:
"The NAA Foundation estimates that about 220 newspapers across the country have special teen pages or sections, many of which are written by teens under the guidance of a newspaper editor. Other sources of youth content for all ages may come from syndicated services that are selling to about 800 newspapers across the country.
The study, 'Lifelong Readers: The Role of Youth Content,' was conducted by Minneapolis-based MORI Research. Findings will be presented today during the NAA Foundation's 2006 Young Reader Conference July 22-26 in St. Louis.
'Lifelong Readers' follows a 2004 NAA Foundation study that revealed a positive relationship between newspaper use in the classroom and lifelong readership. Coupling the results of the two studies suggests that newspaper use in the classroom and readership of teen content increases the likelihood that teen readers will continue to use the newspaper as adults.
When it comes to content, the research shows that content written for teens, by teens or relating to teens tops the list of readership drivers. According to the study:
* 30 percent of young adults said teen content drew them to the paper
* 18 percent cited content that was written by someone they knew or content that featured an interview with someone they knew
* 16 percent cited entertainment news
* 10 percent said general interest news
* 8 percent said advice columns
* 4 percent said comics drove them to the paper.
In addition, those who read teen content along with other news and features in their local newspaper are more likely to read the local paper as adults. According to the study:
* Nearly eight in 10 (78 percent) of respondents who said they read the local paper plus the teen content read their local paper in the past week; 50 percent read their local paper yesterday.
* 81 percent of this group said they read the local Sunday paper in the past four weeks and 66 percent said they read it last Sunday."
August 31st, 2006 at 1:08 pm
Even better, there's a newspaper written by and for Boston teens called TiP–Boston Teens in Print. It's written, edited, and photographed by Boston high school students with oversite from mentors at the Boston Globe and WriteBoston. But the voices are all teens. It's published quarterly and is distributed at all Boston high schools and libraries.