BAVC News
From Freelance to Google, Video Production Pros Break it Down
 September’s Tech Talk Tuesday featured Cleave Frink, Jr. Production Manager and Liz Cabrera, Producer of the Google Developer Studio, video production arm of the Google Engineering team. They gave us a glimpse into how they arrived to their current roles, advice on how to build a career in video production, and how different business settings can influence the types of roles available. And while both Cleave and Liz confirmed that the current video production market is competitive, especially in the corporate realm, demand continues to grow based on how the global population consumes media. So don’t give up! You [...]
Next Gen Alumni Reflection with Sylvia Colt-Lacayo
Three years ago, I was a scrawny, disabled, 8th grader who was always envious of my artistic family. Art runs in my blood, like a torch passed down my family tree, and I always felt like it wasn’t given to me. That was until I stumbled upon BAVC Media, a community of activists who make social change through their art. After applying to the Next Gen Program, I embarked on a journey I didn’t realize would change my life. I found BAVC Media through my older sister’s friend. She had this awesome blue hair and glasses, and knowing her felt [...]
Always be learning
Meet Diane Presler. Visual Designer and BAVC Media Instructor, she brings passion, spirit, and her expert knowledge to courses ranging from InDesign to HTML, and our newest offering Sketch. Â What does teaching mean for your practice? Over the years, how have you navigated your place in the design world? Teaching is how I have navigated my place in the design world. Teaching helped me survive the constant change in the design world. I have embraced change by making my job to study it. And the social aspects of teaching empower me every day. I learn from my students every [...]
TechSF Celebrates First Tech Apprenticeship Placement
 TechSF Celebrates Its First Tech Apprenticeship Placement! In the Fall of 2015, Mayor Ed Lee announced a Department of Labor (DOL) grant awarded to the City of San Francisco to launch the TechSF Apprenticeship Learning Accelerator to offer residents pre-apprenticeships and apprenticeships within the tech sector. BAVC Media and the Office of Economic and Workforce Development are pleased to announce that the first Apprentice in this program has been placed at local tech company, Zendesk. Zendesk, who builds software for better customer relationships, seized the opportunity to host the inaugural TechSF Apprenticeship. Located on Market Street, the company’s commitment [...]
BAVC Media Next Gen at the White House!
Today, BAVC Media celebrates! It is with incredible pride that I share some great news: BAVC Media Next Gen programs – programs that would not exist without our partners and contributors from our many communities – are today being honored by First Lady Michelle Obama at the White House. Why? BAVC Media’s youth program is being recognized for its effectiveness in promoting learning and life skills and receiving the 2016 National Arts and Humanities Youth Program Award, the nation’s highest honor for youth programs! The award recognizes the country’s best after-school and out-of-school-time creative youth development programs for using engagement [...]
The imperfect storm
The day after the election, students at U.C. Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism requested a debrief with their fellow students and faculty. As an alum, I asked to attend. The students expressed shock, fear, outrage, and concern about their chosen profession. Where had journalism gone wrong, and where should they go from here? Does it matter either way? My professional colleagues, many of them veterans, are asking the same questions. There is no doubt that in its quest for survival and relevance, legacy media fell prey to the president elect’s manipulations of the press, and helped catapult him to his [...]
Ted Egan and BAVC Media discuss the future of freelance work in the Bay Area
 What do the fields of construction, advertising, and ride-sharing have in common? In the San Francisco Bay Area, all these industries employ freelancers whose numbers keep growing. How can our local employers support freelance workers in ways that sustain their employment and help strengthen the Bay Area’s workforce in a rapidly changing working economy? At BAVC Media, we believe that storytelling is an important tool for learning and social change so we gathered together lead employers from construction, advertising, and ride-sharing for a shared conversation with Ted Egan, the Chief Economist for the City of San Francisco. We swapped [...]
Summer with Next Gen
Written by Sarah Gonzalez and Nicole Wisler At BAVC Media, we believe it is crucial that the young people we serve have the opportunity to tell their stories in a way that makes a concrete impact on the larger community. As such, this summer, BAVC Media students had the opportunity to put the industry-standard production skills and understanding of social justice frameworks, honed through our project-based curriculum during the school year, to work in partnership with two wonderful organizations: The San Francisco Public Utilities Commission and the Anti-Eviction Mapping Project. These summer Social Action Projects were a capstone to the [...]
BAVC Media Program Helps Young Adults Leap into Local Tech Workforce
BAVC Media’s Inaugural Emerging Media Makers Program Helps Young Adults Leap into the Local Tech Workforce BAVC Media hosted a small group of young adult media makers this past Spring for its inaugural cohort of Emerging Media Makers. The eight participants were ages 18-24, unemployed, out-of-school, and facing significant socioeconomic barriers to employment. BAVC Media has only intermittently worked with these valuable members of our community. Funded by San Francisco’s Office of Economic and Workforce Development, this new program, Emerging Media Makers, was experimental in several ways, and in the end was profoundly instructive and impactful. We focused on what [...]
The Factory in Full Gear
I was completely blown away when I first saw films made by students in The Factory at BAVC Media. The fact that this occurred when I was working as a judge at the Josiah Youth Media Festival all the way in Texas only demonstrates further what big shoes I was filling when I took over as the lead instructor in May of 2014. The Annex has become a second home to many of the students who take ownership of the space and make it their own. One of the walls in the lab space is even dedicated to the people [...]
