Educational Media Reviews Online

Judy Woodruff of Frontline fame traveled the United States in an RV, speaking to sixteen to twenty-five year olds to provide an understanding of their morals, thoughts, lifestyles, and technology use. Backing for the project was provided by the Pew Foundation, Carnegie Corporation and the Annie E. Casey Foundation. Additional information was garnered from a Pew Trust survey and related by Ms. Woodruff and others. Information beyond the study is presented from face to face interviews and video kiosk interviews which took place in the RV. Narration provides analysis of the statements from the interviews which began in California with the hosts of a weekly radio program focusing on challenges and issues of the Generation Nexters called San Diego Gen Y U Radio. This program becomes a kind of framework for the documentary as it is returned to several times for commentary as do the comments of marketing consultant Jane Buckingham. The second group of interviewees is from Alabama, then on to Ohio and finally New York City where author of Generation Debt Anya Kamenetz, is interviewed.

The video seems to focus much more on the upper levels of the age range. Ages were never stated, but from appearances it seems possible that only one or two youth from the 16-19 age range were included in the video. Also, all of the college students interviewed were from Ivy League universities, excepting the larger middle class. In addition, rural areas seem to be underrepresented. Questions included the biggest creators of stress, which turned out in no surprise to be money, job satisfaction versus job security, gay rights, volunteerism which seems to play a large part of their lives, their views on the war in Iraq and challenges to the environment and use of technology.

Filming is similar to that of a television documentary; a blue banner with key points superimposed over street scenes appears during much of the narration. The shorter video kiosk interviews have travel scenes as if the RV were moving displayed off to the sides which are a bit distracting as the viewer might feel the need to determine where they are rather than paying attention to the speaker. Volume and lighting are good. This program provided information about the thought processes, lifestyles, and political views of this generation; however, the focus is a bit unclear. Is it to explain or to prove that they will take over the world successfully as a defense to older generations who disagree with them; or simply to describe? Close captioning is not available, but PBS has an interactive Generation Next website that is quite nice.