S1: Welcome in San Diego. It's Jade Hindman on today's show. Local students explore their multiracial background in the NPR student podcast Challenge. This is KPBS Midday Edition. Connecting our community through conversation. Each year , NPR puts on its student Podcast Challenge , where thousands of young people across the country transform their ideas into audio. Among the finalists for Best Middle School podcast were two students from high tech Middle Media Arts in Point Loma. They produced a podcast called Mixed Voices. It's about growing up in a multiracial family and reconnecting with your multiracial roots. I'm joined now by the students and the teacher who oversaw their project. Eighth graders , Abby Dutra and Orion Navarette. And Rebecca Carnahan. The students know her as Miss Bex. Welcome to you all.
S2: Thank you. Hi. We're so happy to be here.
S1: So glad to have you all here in studio Abby and Orion. Uh , first , congratulations on being named one of the best student podcasts in America.
S2: And the fact that it had been recognized was like , amazing.
S3: I think my reaction was , I was really shocked because I honestly forgot about our podcast over like the summer and over like a few months. So like when we heard , like the news from his specs. I was like , honestly , I was like shocked. It was like , wait , really ? Like our podcast got to the the like the top ten. Like , I , I didn't think our podcast would go that far. So I was honestly like really shocked and like , really proud of ourselves.
S1: Yeah , well , the podcast is inspired by your own heritage and connection to your own cultures.
S2: And although me and Oregon have so many other things in common , we were talking about topics and I go , hey , what if we do something about being Filipino ? And they go , hey , what if we do something about culture as a whole ? and I go , wait , that's a great idea. And so we started brainstorming , and eventually we came to the conclusion of not feeling connected to to certain cultural backgrounds. You have. Orient.
S1: Orient.
S3: So it kind of like brought up like the idea of , like trying to keep your cultural ties as a mixed person , and how it is like being mixed and having all these different cultures connect you and form who you are as being.
S1: And that's where the name of the podcast came from.
S3: That's where like , I like thought of it. I was the one that thought of the name.
S2: Oregon came up with it and I just I thought it was so wonderful. And because we picked the name more toward the end of the process and we were like , what are we going to name this ? And we're brainstorming , we're brainstorming , and we have this document , this Google doc of all of like the names we have , and we're just spouting out like random names at this point or , and just goes mixed voices and then keeps talking and I go , wait , like , that's really cool. And so that's how we decided.
S3: Yeah , I was like thinking like , okay , we're mixed. And also doing a podcast or like talking. So I'm like , what did we just combine like culture and how we're talking and like our voice. So it was like , we're speaking. We're using our voice to like , talk about this. It was like mixed voices. And then we were just like , we got. It's like it like shows context to like where our podcast is about. So I thought it was like a really cool idea.
S1: I mean , the perfect fit , surely. Well , we've got a little snippet from Mixed Voices. Let's take a listen.
S4: When I was little , I told the adults in my life about wanting to know more about my background , the holidays , the food , the dance , the music , and they had no information to give me growing up. And even now , I faked all the knowledge I had in my culture. I acted like I knew everything , when in reality I know nothing. If I ever wanted or want to know anything about my background , I have to educate myself.
S5: I was never taught my family's tongue. I tried to speak Bisaya , But it was so foreign to me I needed to teach myself. When the opportunity arose , I went back to the Philippines and finally understood my family. Nicaragua was almost totally abandoned by my family. Still , today , I feel disconnected with my Nicaraguan side , and since my family left the dictatorship of , I am still not able to go where my family came from. Hmm.
S1: Hmm. How did it feel to to reconnect with your different cultures and embrace your heritage ? It's a it is for sure , a journey. So , Orion , I'll start with you on that one.
S3: Well , it kind of like thinking like about the podcast. I kind of felt like we just like , had to , like , really go back to , like how this all started , like where our family roots are from , where , like , we're from. So it was just like. Like thinking about , like these things. Like , I like , actually like , asked my grandma. Like about like. Hey. Like , how is it in Nicaragua ? Like what is like passing by our culture ? Like , I know we always eat Nicaraguan food like we speak Spanish at home , but I'm like. Like what ? There's like some aspects , like uniquely to Nicaraguan culture. So I think I like also like like I educated myself more about , like my culture with this podcast.
S1:
S2: We at the beginning of this process , we did a lot of research on all of our backgrounds , not only from websites and books and history , but from our families , if that makes sense. And we did spend a lot of time on Filipino culture and heritage and just educating ourselves about that. But then me and Orion branched off into our other sides and started researching about that. And it it felt so connecting , because to have that disconnection and to experience it in small ways in your everyday life feels degrading in a way it really , really hurts. And to but to be able to reconnect and to find that missing piece feels just really good.
S1:
S6: We're very lucky to be at high tech middle media arts within the high tech , high system , a school that , you know , the major tenants are focused on project based learning and student voice and choice and multiple revisions and drafts. And so I think that all of that really leads itself to a project like this. So really , it was just my job to help set up some structures and help keep things moving along and let them know that they are telling an important story , that other people are going to benefit from hearing and just be their cheerleader and let them do their thing. And another great thing about project based learning is we really have the time to spend on projects like this. So we they were making their podcast over a time period of almost maybe three and a half to four months. And so it was really just giving them the time to spend space to figure out what story they want to tell and how they want to tell it and keep working on getting it out there.
S1: You teach humanities and one thing you really focus on and focused on for this project was building skills in digital literacy and research.
S6: And again , that's where the student's interest can really come into play. But but in building those skills. So everyone who had to do who was doing a podcast had to focus on choosing either historical research behind their topic or scientific research behind their topic. So they really had to go in and look at what sources might be beneficial to building their knowledge , their background knowledge about their topics so they could talk about it and educate listeners about it. They also had to interview an expert , which an expert could , you know , could mean a lot of things depending on the topic , so they could probably tell you a little bit more about who they interviewed. But it was other mixed students at school to kind of hear their perspective and see how it lined up with their perspectives. They also got to use Adobe podcast software , and they learned how to record. They learned how to edit in preparation for all of that. They did some nonfiction writing , some informational writing to write their scripts and continuously just revise it. And towards the end of it , they really had to work on figuring out what is the most important aspect of their story to tell. Because and the the contest really lends itself to helping students decide what is important because of the eight minute time limit. So I think they had much more content than eight minutes , as did a lot of their classmates. But to really have to like they had to work really hard to narrow it down just to eight minutes , which included their intro , any music , any interviews , their main claims , and all of the evidence that they were going to be using. So they had to make some tough choices. And I think , you know , all of those things together are really important skills. Absolutely.
S1: Absolutely. They are , I can attest.
S3: But then she shared about like her German culture , which she didn't really feel as much connected. So like we started like talking about like why ? Like both of us don't like , feel connected to like one culture. We feel more connected to like Filipino culture. So like both of our moms are Filipino and both of our dads are really different , um , from different cultural backgrounds. So talking with her about it , it was really like it kind of like opened , like my mind's like thinking , like how why we're so , like , disconnected from , like , one culture. It kind of like , brought up , like new ideas. And it also helped me in the in like the podcast , like thinking , what should I say about it ? Like what ? Like what evidence ? Like what different ? What other claims should I add ? So yeah.
S1: Lots to think about. Like it's a common experience for a lot of people with mixed backgrounds to just identify with one culture over the other.
S2: And when I say Filipino pride , I just mean Filipinos. They are proud , proud people. And when you are around those people , there is just so much. What's what's another word for like boldness ? Like it's just it's it's a strong , strong community. Yeah. It's it's pride. It's a strong community.
S1: It's a strong community and a large community too.
S2: Oh , yeah.
S3: Something that like , didn't get put in our podcast that we're also thinking about , like why we like , represent with like one side over the other. It was like people might like look closer related to like , one culture than the other. Like , I know that I look way more Filipino. I get like , always like people think that I'm like full Filipino and like I tell them like , oh , I mixed like , they don't really , like , see that about me ? Like , oh , you're mixed. Wait , really ? Like people don't believe me ? So I think , like , well , Abby was saying that there's like a whole big Filipino culture in San Diego And like I think that also helped. Like , um. Especially like places like Mira mesa or like National City. There's a lot of , like Filipino. Um , yeah , there's like a lot of Filipino community and like , there's a whole bunch of representation in those communities. So I do feel like more like tied in with Filipino culture with that reason. Like , I've been to , like the Philippines several times. I speak the language , but like also , I've never I , I speak Spanish , but I've never been to like Nicaragua or any of those areas. So there's a lot of like like there's also a lot of like Mexican communities because we're like San Diego. Like like literally Mexico's across the border. So it's like there's a lot of Spanish speaking people in San Diego. And there's also a lot of like the dialogue and all of their Filipino like dialect speaking in San Diego. So I think there's like a lot of representation here for those like , um , for those like communities , but like it's also like since you're part of different communities , I think you tend to like stick more to one community instead of like , fully like how ? Like being , oh , I'm part of this community and I'm part of that community. You start , like , drifting away from one community.
S1: What do you hope. People.
S3: People.
S1:
S2: And so we wanted to take initiative and try to put out something that people can relate to , because it always feels good to know you are not alone. And this could inspire more mixed people like us to be like , oh , maybe I don't know more about this side of my culture. Maybe I want to. Maybe I want to learn it and experience it because me and Orient truly believe that culture is one of the greatest things humans have , and it is slowly dying. It is slowly being lost because of certain situations and because of lack of information. And we truly believe that if we are able to speak about it , enough people will. They will revive their culture and we will. Culture won't die.
S3: I think I want people like , yeah , I was like , I agree with Abby what she said , but I want yeah , I want people to like take away that culture is like such a big part of you. Like , I think like I've noticed like over generations , like culture like slowly starts , like fading a little bit. If it's not , like tall enough , it's not like if it's like , like not brought up with every generation to come. So like , I think like when me and Abby were , like , thinking. Like , what's , like , the main thing that we want people to take away. It was just like , want people to. Take away that they there's some there's other people like them. People that other people that are mixed that feel. Unrepresented. And I think that we also wanted to have people to take away that we could , we could like bring up like culture. We could. Like , talk about how , um , how your culture really identifies as you like , really that like what it shapes you so well.
S1: It sounds like an excellent podcast , and I can't wait for so many people to check it out. I've been speaking with eighth graders Abby Dutra and Oriana Navarette , as well as seventh grade humanities teacher Rebecca Carnahan. We'll link the full podcast on our web site Abby or Rebecca ? Thanks so much for your time and congratulations.
S2: Thank you so much for having us.
S7: Thank you.
S1: Thanks for joining us today. If you missed anything , you can download KPBS Midday Edition on all podcast apps. Don't forget to watch Evening Edition tonight at five for in-depth reporting on San Diego issues. Also , you can always share your feedback or segment ideas at midday at pbs.org. Or you can give us a call. The number is (619) 452-0228. I'm Jade Hindman. Join us tomorrow to hear about the Italian Film Festival during Midday Edition's arts and culture show. Until then , have a great day on purpose , everyone.
