AOL will host Reel Works’ films on AOL True Stories - a new website dedicated to documentary films. Each week, Lab teens will choose and release a new film to be featured on AOL bringing our powerful brand of storytelling to millions of new viewers.

Filmmakers will maintain personal blogs as a way to bring their films further to life and an open channel of communication with the public. Visitors to AOL’s Reel Works page can view films for free or purchase downloads or DVD’s. Teens can click through to www.reelworks.org to learn more about the Lab.

Ten films were selected for the launch including Emmy Winners “Clay Life” and “I Wish” along with Kiri Davis’ much acclaimed “A Girl Like Me.” Reel Works is the only youth media group invited to participate in the launch of AOL True Stories!

Lab Grad Kiri Davis was featured on ABC World News with Charles Gibson on December 23, 2006 discussing her film, “A Girl Like Me.” In the segment, ABC producer Ursula Fahy focused on Kiri’s inspired recreation of Dr. Kenneth Clark’s “Doll Test” and her discovery – when fifteen of twenty-one black children preferred the white doll over the black doll – how little has changed in fifty years. Or, as Kiri has commented, “Even at four or five years old, you can tell what America values.”

“A Girl Like Me” has sparked a national debate on race, self- esteem and standards of beauty since its release last year. Kiri and her film have been written about in the Daily News, Ebony Magazine, Jet Magazine and she has been interviewed live on CNN’s American Morning, Good Morning America, NPR’s Talk of the Nation and the Steve Harvey Radio Show. Over 700,000 people have watched the film online and it is today being used as an educational tool in classrooms and community centers nationwide.

Kiri, a student at the Urban Academy in Manhattan, participated in The Lab in Spring 2005. Her mentor was acclaimed documentary filmmaker, Shola Lynch.

Congratulations to the three Reel Works students, Will Quinones, Ariella Goldstein, and Vanessa Bateau, who were selected by ListenUp! to participate in the Adobe Reel Ideas Studio at the 2007 Sundance Film Festival. Vanessa, Will, and Ari, along with 7 other young filmmakers, will be creating a real-time document of their experiences at the festival and posting the videos and blogs they create to their website (www.reelideasstudio.com) from Jan 24-28, 2007.

Mark your calendars! NYU will be visiting Reel Impact this Monday (Jan 22) at 5pm to discuss the Tisch Summer Workshops for high school students. You can earn six college credits studying film and television or dramatic writing in New York, Dublin, or Paris. Scholarships are available, so be sure to come out to Reel Impact this Monday to learn more about this exciting program!

Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz declared, “We must support and invest in projects like Reel Works which satisfy our young people's curiosity in the arts and encourage them to not only appreciate creativity, but be creators themselves,” at our First Annual Benefit at BAM on November 14, 2006. Over 100 friends and supporters came out for the screening and reception, raising over $26,000 to keep The Lab open and free for NYC teens.

Thank you to the Reel Works Board of Directors, Event Chair Allan F. Kramer and co-chairs Ursula Davis, Ann Ellis and Ralph Guild for making our first fund-raiser such a great success. We are deeply grateful to our event sponsors, Independence Community Foundation, Brooklyn Brewery, The Greene Grape and Aunt Suzie’s Restaurant for underwriting our celebration of the brilliant young filmmakers who make up The Lab.

And of course, thank you to all our individual donors for your amazing support for our work with Brooklyn teens.

January is National Mentoring Month and the Mentoring Partnership of NYC has released two public service announcements featuring Reel Works.

Two pairs of mentors and “mentees” were filmed and interviewed about the power and impact of mentoring for the two spots which will run all month long on NY’s CW-11 Channel.

“As soon as he became my mentor, we became friends” says Vincent Turturice of his mentor, filmmmaker Jason Pollard, who helped him produce his Spring 2006 Lab documentary “Modeled Citizens” about his move from private to public school. “I get tremendous satisfaction out of mentoring,” says Pollard, “I get to see a young person progress and grow.”

“Reel Works is the embodiment of Mentor's motto "Share what you know...Pass it On,” remarked Bruce Beckwith, Director of Services for The Mentoring Partnership of New York.