Lucian Perkins, a photojournalist for The Washington Post, documented graduates of The Covenant House Artisans Woodworking Program, a career-training initiative that teaches homeless and at-risk youth fine woodworking. A local business in Washington, DC, hired some program graduates. Watch here to see how that worked out.
Nina Berman, a New-York based photojournalist, traveled to the Open Door Shelter in Chicago, Illinois, to photograph Jonathan Smith, 20, for Do1Thing.org .
Smith has been living at the shelter for several months. He grew up outside of Buffalo, New York in a household of alcoholism and abuse with several reports filed to the state’s child protection services by his school and neighbors. He left home at 16 and has had minimal contact with his family. He described his childhood as one that left him “emotionally and physically scarred.”
This presentation is a SoundSlides audio slideshow converted to video.
Judy DeHaas, a photojournalist at the Rocky Mountain News, documented the lives of a young couple for Do1Thing.org. Michael Cunningham, 20, and his girlfriend Lea Hallaway, 18, have been together for about a year. They stay from time to time at Urban Peak, a shelter for homeless youth in Denver. DeHaas tells Do1Thing.org:
Being homeless is difficult for the pair, but they strive to stay together and support each other.
Michael was taken from his alcoholic father when he was three-years-old and placed in at least 42 foster homes by the time he was emancipated in February 2008. His mother disappeared when he was around 3. After leaving foster care, he was unable to hold down a job and wound up on the streets.
His last foster home was with Lea’s aunt, where the couple met. Lea’s mother, a crack addict died when she was 6, and she was taken into the system at 2. After living in a series of foster homes, she was adopted, but Lea started to run away when she turned 13 and was asked to move out by the time she was 16.
The couple has slept on friend’s couches, in shelters and in cheap motels while trying to get a grip on their lives and stabilize, something neither of them learned from their parents or their brief stays in foster homes.
The donations kept pouring in until the volunteers finally packed away the donation table out front. Those of us in Houston would like to thank all of our subjects for allowing us to tell their stories, the hard-working staff at Covenant House, all the volunteers, and the countless Houstonians who came out to Do 1 Thing today.
Andres checks out some donated sneakers in a room that was filled to overflowing. It took three rooms like this to handle the outpouring of donations from the community. (Photo by Smiley N. Pool)
Writer Jessica Johns Pool got into the spirit of the day. (Photo by Smiley N. Pool)
To learn more about Houston’s Do1Thing team, visit these Web sites:
Dave Einsel, photographer: www.daveeinsel.com
Amina Rivera, writer: www.dailycougar.com
Robert Seale, photographer: www.robertseale.com
Todd Spoth, visual journalist: www.toddspoth.com
Jessica Johns Pool, writer: www.jjpeditorial.com
Smiley Pool, photojournalist: www.smileypool.com
Born and raised in Washington, D.C., Marie Claire graduated from the University of Maryland College Park in 2006 with a BA in Psychology. After traveling to Ethiopia for the first time in 2005, she took up photography full time.
Marie Claire has traveled to Ethiopia four times, living there for a total of 18 months. Now fluent in the national language, Amharic, she is planning to learn French, Swahili and Arabic.
She photographs of issues which effect communities at large. In Washington she covered the 2006 Immigration rally, the Invisible Children rally for young child soldiers in Uganda and soup kitchens feeding the homeless of the District of Columbia. In Ethiopia, she photographed AIDs effected orphans, community of coffee farmers in Sidamo, and a donkey mobile library.
Currently she resides in New York City where she is a full time student at the International Center of Photography (ICP) in their Photojournalism and Documentary Program. Marie Claire is a member of the National Press Photographers Association (NPPA). Lastly she is interning with Do1Thing.
After completing her schooling, Marie Claire plans to return to Africa to complete on going projects.
I have been interested in photography since I received my first film camera at the age of six. Being a photojournalism student at Penn State has opened many doors for me and provided experiences that have directly contributed to my development as a journalist, artist and most importantly an empathetic adult.
The photojournalism program has allowed me to now branch out into video and multimedia, which I have become very passionate about. I consider my new skills to be very important and useful tools to impact and affect society. I am seeking any opportunities that will allow me continued growth as a journalist and story teller.
In her words: I like to think I can tell stories. Stories about the life of a subpoena, stories about rival visiting football fans, stories about riots, same-sex commitment ceremonies, an 81-year-old college football coach and presidential candidates.
I used to tell these stories through print articles, but I’ve transitioned full speed from my print background into multimedia. If a photo is worth a thousand words, then video has to be worth at least a million and I think my stories have got a mouthful to say.
I decided at a young age that I would be a journalist. Having lived in one place for my entire life, I decided that journalism would be a way to see the world and write about the people I meet and places I visit. A job that includes traveling would be a dream come true and I want to do as much multimedia work as possible. I like change and the pace of journalism gives me that. Newsrooms are also changing and I’d be able to contribute to that transition after I graduate this semester.
Nicole Frugé joined the San Antonio Express-News in April 2003. She has covered the war in Iraq, returning frequently to the region to document the lives of ordinary Iraqis and American soldiers coping with the evolving conflict and its consequences.
She photographed other major news events including the 2008 presidential election and Hurricane Katrina, as well as more intimate projects on homeless families and the decline of the independent Texas shrimper.
Her work has been honored by NPPA’s Best of Photojournalism, Pictures of the Year International, Atlanta Photojournalism Seminar and the Southern Short Course in News Photography.
Frugé is a wayward Cajun, born in New Orleans, who fell in love with all things Texan. In her free time, she’s happiest wearing an old pair of Wranglers and eating crawfish.
In his own words: I have come to see my biography as a litany of blessings. Blessed to confess “Jesus is Lord.” And know I am saved.
Blessed with miracle healing in 2002 from stage four leukemia. The Lord gave me a little more time to tell stores with pictures about his kingdom and his servants.
Blessed with a long career in photojournalism. Career blessings include a Pulitzer in 1970 and publications in just about every major news magazine. Career journey includes stops in New York, Miami, Los Angeles, and now in Colorado Springs, an especially blessed time of humble commitment to photography for Christian ministry.
Blessed with Marilynne’s love and support for 40 year. Blessed with Stephen and Michelle and the three grandchildren they’ve given us, including Sarah Jo, the ballerina. She is teaching grandpa to see the world through the eyes of a child again. view Starr’s work
Judy (Walgren) DeHaas, 45, graduated from the University of Texas in Austin with a degree in Journalism in 1986. She took her first job in Odessa, Texas, with the Odessa American in 1987. Three months later, the Dallas Morning News hired her, where she worked until March 1999, covering socially relevant issues at home and abroad, such as immigration, war and famine, peace and reconciliation, and poverty throughout the world.
Judy was part of a team of journalists for the Morning News that received the 1994 Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting for their series on violent human rights abuses against women worldwide. For the series, she was the first person to photograph a female genital mutilation ceremony in Somalia and the News was the first newspaper to publish photos about the practice. Her book about the Lost Boys of southern Sudan was published in September 1998 by Houghton-Mifflin.
From 1999 to 2004, Judy based herself in Taos, New Mexico, and worked as a freelance photographer for publications such as Texas Monthly, National Geographic Traveler, People Magazine, and The New York Times. She traveled the world shooting promotional photos for the Peace Corps’ recruiting campaign, contributed to Peter Jennings’s last book, In Search of America, co-directed a film on tribal elders in Kenya and produced and shot a documentary film about the Quechua-speaking people in Peru.
Among her other achievements are: an Award of Excellence from the Robert F. Kennedy Foundation, The Harry Chapin World Hunger Award, The Barbara Jordan Award for reporting on people with disabilities, the APME Photojournalism Award and the AMPE Sweepstakes Award for her series dealing with immigrants and refugees in Dallas, the Headliners Award for her work in Southern Sudan and the Texas Council Against Violence Award for her work with abused women, several Colorado Press Association, Colorado Associated Press, and Colorado Association of Black Journalists awards, a Communication Arts Award of Excellence and several American Photography Awards.
In 2004, Judy joined the staff at the Rocky Mountain News, where she works as a multimedia photographer, editor, producer, and writer, working with various cameras and software platforms. She lives in Denver with her husband Peter and their two sons, Theo, 2, and Hans, 14.
Visit Judy’s site