(Not a Comprehensive List!)

Winter

SCAT began participation in the grant-funded after school program, the 21st Century Community Learning Center. SCAT staffer, Karl Nazir, traveled to the Winter Hill and Powerhouse Schools each week to teach video production and media literacy to middle school students. At the end of the 10-week sessions, the classes screened their videos to other students and teachers, and of course, they were cablecast on Channel 3.

SCAT Membership and Arts Coordinator, Lisa Smith, created a program about Stephen Todd Booker, a poet on death row in Florida. The video was shown to the state’s appellate Court and
the judge responded by moving Booker’s trial date up by two years.

The Annual meeting has held on January 22. It was a fun-filled evening with great food from local businesses, awards, and board games for post-meeting entertainment. The entire event was cablecast live.

Spring

Ellie Pye, Executive Director of SCAT since 2002 and staff member since 1998, left SCAT to start up a new PEG Access center in North Andover. The Board of Directors asked former E.D., Mimi Graney, to serve as interim E.D. while they conducted a thorough search for Ellie’s replacement.

SCAT’s 21st Century Learning Center activities moved to the Healy School. Karl had well-trained teaching assistants, two SAY Media graduates, Erlia Dessin and Flobert Dormevil.

SCAT was a judging site for the 2004 Hometown Video Festival. Judges were Joe Constantine, Justin Goltermann, Jeanne Haross, Lisa Klingebiel, David Mihalyfy and Michael Van Devere.

The Commonwealth Broadband Collaborative continued its First Tuesday program that was cablecast simultaneously in Somerville, Malden, Cambridge, Boston and Lowell. SCAT’s contribution was a program that included a panel discussion called “Is Science Serving the Public Interest?” that was hosted by Dale Patterson. Lisa Smith’s program about Stephen Todd Booker was another show segment.

A media lending library was established for members to explore the history of mass media and the impact of media on our society. SCAT member, Zina Costiner, and former member, Brett Rhyne, donated many of the materials to start the collection.

Summer

SCAT hired Wendy Blom as Executive Director. She had 8 years of experience in access television as a Director at Lowell Telecommunications Corp. and at Boston Neighborhood Network.

The Latino Youth Peer Leadership Program at The Community Action Agency of Somerville completed its three-year project of producing anti-smoking video projects at SCAT.

The SCAT training program added a new class, DVD authoring, taught by Karl Nazir. Now that many producers are submitting their programs on DVD, there is a demand among members to learn to create menu pages and chapters on their DVD’s using iDVD software.

SCAT had a booth at the annual ArtBeat event in Davis Square and members captured the sights and sounds for a taped program for cablecast. The program was edited by Elissa Mintz. Other members volunteered to help produce SCAT’s improv theater production that took place on the street.

Non-profit organizational members were invited to have SCAT produce a public service announcement for their organization for a $100 fee.

Fall

SCAT and CCTV were the host sites for the Fall Conference of the Northeast Region of the Alliance for Community Media. Ellie Pye returned to Somerville to coordinate a “Two By You” screening of short tapes about access centers at the Somerville Theater and four workshops, drawing about 50 access center members and staff, took place at SCAT. SCAT member, Joanne La Riccia, won an award at the Conference Video Festival for her innovative children’s program, JoJo’s Dreamcart.

Lisa Smith, SCAT’s Membership and Arts Coordinator, left SCAT to join Ellie Pye in North Andover. Vanessa Vartabedian was hired to continue Lisa’s great work.

The City of Somerville repaired the front of SCAT’s building and painted it in Victorian style red white and blue. The outside makeover was completed with colorful banners and a front door awning donated by Board Member Tony Lafuente, owner of Flagraphics.

A group of television students from Chuo University in Tokyo came to SCAT to learn about American public access television in the hope of starting something similar in Japan. They toured the facility and interviewed Wendy Blom on-camera for a segment that will be part of their TV program in Japan.

SCAT’s 21st Century Learning Center classes began again at the East Somerville Community School. Taught by Wendy and Vanessa, the weekly classes included a digital storytelling project. The students wrote a short script about some aspect of their lives, took photographs that illustrated the story, and then learned to use iMovie to blend the elements to create short personal videos.

The By and for Somerville production Company was established as a way to provide a group production experience to members for fun and to improve their production skills. The first project was an interview with members of the Somerville High School football team.

Students from Somerville Center for Adult Learning Experience (SCALE) and their teacher, Sydney Story, came to SCAT for a special studio production class. They learned to use television to inform the immigrant community about healthcare options in the US.

In conjunction with the Union Square Affair, sponsored by the Somerville Arts Council, SCAT produced a program called “Word Play.” It was a literary showcase of local writers, storytellers and poets taped in the SCAT studio. Hot Set producer, Doug Holder coordinated the writers and hosted the show. SCAT was also a Windows Art Project exhibit site for an installation by artist, Denise Malis.

To aid voter education efforts, SCAT videotaped a candidate for State Representative debate between Rep. Pat Jehlen (D) and Dane Baird (R) that took place at the Independent Restaurant.