Sunday, June 20, 2010

Y R U UU on YouTube.com



In an effort to learn more about being a Unitarian Universalist, our UU Middle School Students (UU Mids?) decided that the best way to find out about being a UU is by asking our congregation members.

We began by discussing  what we wanted to know about being a UU and then developed questions that would provide that information. We wrote the questions on a chartboard and invited some congregation members to join us for an interview in our classroom.  The interviewers reviewed the questions with the congregational member before they began.

After the interviews were completed, we reviewed the footage. It was fun to watch the interviews because their answers were interesting, well spoken and at times amusing. The question that elicited the best answers was “What is Unitarian Universalism all about?”  We decided to turn these answers into the first episode of a series of videos that we have (and will) post on Youtube.com

We found that our interviewees divided their answers about the meaning of UUism into the following areas: 1) A Spiritual Journey; 2) The Freedom to Explore; 3) Following the 7 Principles; 4) Supportive Community; and 5) Being Who I Am.  We divided the 5-minute video into those categories.

We had quite a team of workers. Our two producers were Hanna Gibson and Grace Grinstead-Hessburg. The rest of the team broke into groups of two. One person was the camera person and the other was the person who asked the interview questions. These teams were composed of Leo Gibson, Seth Harwood, Sam Grinstead-Hessburg, Bennett King, Micky Fishback, Ty Bellfry and Charlotte Brandenburg.

Special thanks to our interviewees: Al Hays, Heather Flory, Chrystal king, John Grinstead, Christine Carpenter, Mike Knapp, Sheri Huber-Otting, Jeff Heinman and Stephen Orsborn.

Please provide feedback about the video and future topics that we might cover.