Living Newspaper Project

The Living Newspaper Project, a collaboration of the Humanities Institute, the Bernard and Audre Rapoport Center for Human Rights and Justice, the Performance as Public Practice Program of UT's Department of Theatre and Dance, and Theatre Action Project, is an innovative new program to reinvigorate civic education in Austin-area high schools through the dramatization of current human rights issues.

The program's main component, Living Newspapers Across the Disciplines, provides high school teachers with the tools to guide their students through a Living Newspaper unit in an English, Social Studies, or Theater Arts classroom. Because a Living Newspaper—literally, a newspaper brought to life—combines research on current events, critical and creative writing, and public performance, students gain important skills and a greater ability to understand and affect the world around them through an interdisciplinary, hands-on, collaborative project.

Participating teachers receive the Living Newspaper Resource Guide, a comprehensive package containing TEKS-aligned model lesson plans, evaluative tools, and resources, and the ongoing support of a program team comprised of subject specialists, UT Austin graduate and professional students, and UT Austin faculty. In addition to the academic skills emphasized by the program, students will also benefit from relationships with graduate and professional student guest teachers and, through them, exposure to an unprecedented array of post-secondary school opportunities and careers in the humanities, higher education, law, public affairs, and the arts.

Media Coverage
The Living Newspaper Project was featured in a Round Rock Leader story on March 27, 2008. Click here to read the story.

For more information, please contact the Institute at (512) 471-2654 or humedu@humanitiesinstitute.utexas.edu.