Benton Spirit

BENTON SPIRIT COMMUNITY NEWSPAPER

Benton Spirit has been a public science partner with BEST Early from its inception in 2001. Our historic partnership is documented in Chapter 12 of the 2016 ACS Symposium book entitled The Power and Promise of Early Research. This chapter was co-edited with Princella Tobias, Founding Publisher of the Benton Spirit.

Benton Spirit has also published several BEST Early student-authored columns, such as, LabTales, Elements Around Us, and ChemSemBlog. In addition, together we produced two special issues in 2013 (Expect Amazing) and 2014 (Imagine Different) featuring research conducted by my Grade 12 students. The cover pages are shown below.

Benton Spirit, consistent with the BEST Early philosophy and mission, also provides opportunities for young people to work and learn to become journalists. It does so by engaging local Benton Harbor youth in early participation programs such as, Aspiring Young Journalists, Generation X, Journaling Our Future, and Taking it to the Streets. This involves them researching, interviewing, photographing, and writing.