LAGUNA BEACH : Student Video Wins First-Place Award

Students and parents from Top of the World Elementary School have received a first-place award from the International Student Media Festival for a segment of a student anti-drug video documentary produced at the school last year.

The video, called “Guess Who?,” was produced by the school’s Kid Vid club, a group of 40 fourth-grade students and parents who spent a month of their time producing the video after school.

“It’s a real classy video and was done with a lot of care,” said Principal Marge Hobbs. “They spent many, many hours after school dreaming up their own skits and ideas.”

The video, which features many of the students, explores the positive aspects of remaining drug-free and finding alternatives to using drugs, Hobbs said.

“It’s important to reinforce these things at a young age,” Hobbs said. “If the only drug education we have is in high school, then we’ve missed the boat because attitudes are formed very early.”

The media festival is part of the Conference of the Assn. for Educational Communications and Technology in Washington.

“Guess Who?” won over 50 other entries in its division. The students produced the video after brainstorming ideas and writing scripts. They also learned to operate video cameras so they could film footage themselves, said Linda Krinsky, one of three parent volunteers who supervised the project.

The video also has garnered several other awards, including two awards from the California Media and Library Educators Assn. and a first-place award for children’s programming from Western Access Video Excellence.

“We have a library with a wall full of trophies from this project,” Hobbs said. “It’s really good to see because it was a labor of love for the students and the parents.”

The video, which has been aired several times on Dimension Cable in Laguna Beach, can be checked out from the Laguna Beach branch of the Orange County Public Library at 363 Glenneyre St.