For this fully remote project,students created silkscreened posters at home, interviewed stakeholders and decision makers over Zoom, and worked online to collaboratively edit together a short documentary film that explores ideas of police accountability and public safety. 

Students debuted their film, Good Cops? Bad Cops? More Cops? No Cops? through a public presentation, where they presented their film and shared their creative process to almost one hundred attendees.  

Learn more about the project here! Watch their film here!

Students also shared their project with other youth in the community through several peer-to-peer workshops. CUP students screened their film, shared their creative process, and faciliated conversations about the issue in small groups. Read some of their reactions below!

“It was fun to see other people’s perspectives… I felt accomplished because now we got to share our project with people in other programs, that are our age and they’re people from our community that can relate to this issue and know what we’re going through.” – Ronny Medina, Student

“It was interesting because they were so much older than me and I tend to get a little imposter syndrome… I thought it was a good conversation. There was a sense of community – even though I live in a different part of Red Hook – I live in the whitest hipster part of Red Hook. It made me more aware of the divide.” – Sullivan Hunter, Student

“I felt like it was a relief and I felt accomplished to know that we came this far and gained so much knowledge. Coming into this, I knew about [the issue], but I learned so much more from this project. And actually giving this information to kids in my same neighborhood was great!” – Brandon Vasquez, Student