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Express Yourself!™ Teen Radio Celebrates 4 Years on Voice America Kids

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Express Yourself!™ Teen Radio Celebrates 4 Years on Voice America Kids

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November marks the four-year anniversary of Express Yourself!™ Teen Radio broadcasting on the Voice America Kids Network. 191 new shows have hit the world wide airwaves with talented young people as hosts and reporters. Created and produced by entertainment veteran, Cynthia Brian, Express Yourself!™ Teen Radio is a special outreach program of Be the Star You Are!® 501 c3 charity giving youth a voice to be listened to.

In 2011 the program launched with two teen hosts and four reporters. Since that time, thirty two adolescents have joined the STAR Team of hosts and reporters sharing their ideas, expertise, and learning to be adept interviewers.  They have interviewed best selling authors, TV celebrities, rock stars, Olympians, sport idols, change makers, teen entrepreneurs, business icons, and everyday heroes.
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And these kids are winning major national accolades. Two of the reporters won $15,000 scholarships as America’s top teen entrepreneurs of 2015. Others have been featured on major TV shows, won musical competitions, and been accepted to top universities such as Harvard, Yale, Cornell, Stanford, CAL Berkeley, and Pepperdine. These teens are shining brightly.

Each week, a line-up of fascinating guests are interviewed based on a theme from the award winning book, Be the Star You Are!® for TEENS at NOON PT on Voice America Kids. Whether it’s friendship, fortitude, happiness, or bullying, the Express Yourself!™ stars bring their own views and opinions to the conversation.
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Congratulations to Be the Star You Are!® 501 c3 charity, Express Yourself!™ Teen Radio, and Voice America for achieving this inspirational milestone.

Be the Star You Are!® is a Top Rated 501 c3 charity dedicated to empowering women, families, and youth through increased literacy and improved positive media messages. Be the Star You Are!® grows people. Teens making a difference and shining brightly are definitely something to crow about!
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Listen to Express Yourself!™ on the Voice America Kids Network every Tuesday at NOON PT.
Archives, photos, information, and links are available Here.
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Learn more about Be the Star You Are!® 501 c3
If you are a teen interested in auditioning for our STAR team, email producer Cynthia Brian at Cynthia@Star-Style.com.

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Staying Connected While Traveling Abroad By Caiseen Kelley

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Staying Connected While Traveling Abroad By Caiseen Kelley

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When my mom came to America for her graduate degree, she lacked the resources and funds to talk to her family often. She often laments about her experiences with the long distance and how hard it was for her to communicate with her loved ones back in her homeland. Luckily for students going abroad today, the story is a lot different. 

There is a plethora of apps and websites that help people stay connected with home. Skype is a popular software application that allows you to get free face-to-face time with people anywhere in the world. In addition, Skype has paid options for international calling, which are often a lot cheaper than telephone services. Another alternative would is Google Hangout. Google Hangout allows video chat in a group setting. You can invite all members of your family to “hangout” on a Google page where you can all see one another. 

A common problem with traveling abroad is feeling disconnected with your friends or family. Often it is the little moments that make us feel lonely, wishing that we could share our adventures. Now using apps like Snapchat you can document these special times. If you use Apple TV or Chromecast you can even share the shows you are watching with your loved ones thus creating a “movie date” esque setting. When you have a certain someone in your life that has been left behind, the apps Couple or Avocado may be perfect. Couple and Avocado allow you to send sketches, messages, pictures, stickers, and thumbprints to someone else in a password protected arena. For the more forgetful individual, the app Romantimatic is your ticket to being responsible. It allows you to send yourself reminders to text your friends and relations to keep connected.

Thankfully for our generation, this new technology helps us enjoy a more relaxing summer of traveling or studying abroad without losing contact with family and friends. With these applications, travelers can focus more on the culture while being immersed in exciting foreign experiences without feeling homesick because “home” is just a click or chat away.  

An Orinda 10th grader, Caiseen Kelley is the Be the Star You Are!® radio coordinator and Techie Talk reporter for Express Yourself! as well as a competitive swimmer, coach, and piano player.  Read more at The Lamorinda Weekly.

As the editor and teen coach for Teen Scene for the newspaper, Cynthia Brian has had the opportunity to work with talented teens with attitude and opinions. She shares selected published works. To read numerous articles shepherded by Cynthia, visit www.BTSYA.com. Cynthia Brian also produces Express Yourself!™ on Voice America Kids Network heard Tuesdays NOON PT at  or for photos, descriptions, links, and more.

Express Yourself!™ Teen Radio is produced by Cynthia Brian of Starstyle® Productions, llc as an outreach program of Be the Star You Are!® charity. For information on being a guest emailinfo@BetheStarYouAre.org. To make a tax-deductible donation to keep this positive youth programming broadcasting weekly to international audiences.

Thanks for supporting teens!

Teens & Cell Phones – Use, not Abuse. By Alex Lee Edited by Cynthia Brian

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Teens & Cell Phones – Use, not Abuse. By Alex Lee Edited by Cynthia Brian

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            Facebook. Twitter. Instagram. Tumblr. iMessage. All of them on your phone. What’s the similarity between them? If you answered that they’re all social networking sites or applications, you are only partially correct. The connection is that most of us are addicted to them. 

Let’s admit it. Every time we feel that vibration in our pockets or hear our unique jingle ring on our phones, we must check right away. We enjoy the convenience of having phones with internet data for faster access. And what’s the quickest way to check our social networking sites? OUR PHONES

Here’s a question that every teen needs to answer. “Do I use or abuse my cell phone privileges?”

          Andrew Chow, a sophomore in Lafayette said, “I think most teenagers are abusing the main purpose of using mobile phones which is using the device as a phone. Teens text or use Facebook and log into social networks too often, getting distracted from school work and other more important priorities.” 

          Christian Linfoot, a junior, also from Lafayette, said that teenagers these days “use their cell phones constantly because they communicate quickly and easily with each other and are able to stay in touch like never before.”

          Teenagers are sucked into the harmful whirlwind of social networking on their phones. We don’t even realize that we’re abusing our cell phone privileges and exposing ourselves to danger. Texting while driving has become the number one reason for adolescent accidents. When we’re using social networking on our phones, how much time are we spending actually talking face to face with our friends? 

          Many of my friends have an iPhone or some other brand of smartphone. Smartphones are the phones of dreams. They provide us with games, messaging, email, social networking, apps, cameras, address books, and more. They are not just phones but also personal assistants and entertainment systems. However, phones were originally created to help us communicate with other human beings when we couldn’t see them in person. It’s important to remember that, instead of talking to friends on social networking sites, we need to still speak with them in person.

          In my opinion, teenagers spend too much time social networking via their phones. Social networking has become an abhorrent source of bullying. According to studies done by many major universities, more than 56% of teens have said that they have once been the target of a cyber-bullying activity. Using a cell phone to degrade someone on Facebook or Twitter has the possibility of destroying the reputation and life of another person. If we don’t have the courage to confront someone in person, we should not do it online either. People feel protected by their screens, incorrectly believing that whatever they say are “just words” on a display. Nasty or demeaning verbiage or photos is never acceptable and could have a devastating and life-threatening effect on the person being bullied.

School is in session, and every teen has the responsibility of understanding that our purpose is to study and learn. Although our friends are just down the hallway, they are also at the touch of our fingertips on our phones. Before we push “send”, we need to think. Which is more important to our futures – social networking or schoolwork? Checking our cell phones constantly while at school is abusing our educational options.

My advice is to use our phones responsibly. Turn it off when we are in the classroom. If the message is that critical, we’ll receive it soon enough. Most everything can wait. Be a user, not an abuser.

Alex Lee is a sophomore at Acalanes High School and the social media reporter for #Hashtag on Express Yourself!™ Teen Radio.  He enjoys watching TV, listening to music, and playing his guitar. 

Facebook. Twitter. Instagram. Tumblr. iMessage. All of them on your phone. What’s the similarity between them? If you answered that they’re all social networking sites or applications, you are only partially correct. The connection is that most of us are addicted to them.

Read at:

https://www.lamorindaweekly.com/archive/issue0715/Teens-and-Cell-Phones-Use-not-Abuse.html

 As the editor and teen coach for Teen Scene for the newspaper, Cynthia Brian has had the opportunity to work with talented teens with attitude and opinions. She shares selected published works. To read numerous articles shepherded by Cynthia, visit www.BTSYA.com. Cynthia Brian also produces Express Yourself!™ on Voice America Kids Network heard Tuesdays NOON PT at http://www.voiceamerica.com/show/2014/express-yourself or for photos, descriptions, links, and more visit http://www.ExpressYourselfTeenRadio.com 

©2013
Cynthia Brian
The Goddess Gardener
I am available as a speaker, designer, and consultant.  
Cynthia will answer one or more questions every other issue as space allows. Email your comments or questions to Cynthia@GoddessGardener.com 
 
Cynthia Brian is the producer and host of StarStyle®-Be the Star You Are!® heard LIVE every Wednesday on the Voice America Empowerment Channel from 4-5pm PT at . More information is available at http://www.StarStyleRadio.com

 

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