Nick News with Linda Ellerbee: Children of the Storm
Airs Sunday, July 2, 2006, 8:30 p.m. ET/PT on Nickelodeon
NEW YORK, June 15 /PRNewswire/ -- In the next installment of Nick News,
Linda Ellerbee returns to New Orleans to see how kids there are coping
almost a year after hurricane Katrina ravaged their city. While grown-ups
work to restore the basics: food, shelter and clothing; kids are struggling
to find ways to cope with the loss, to remember but not live in the past.
Nicks News with Linda Ellerbee: Children of the Storm, airing Sunday, July
2, at 8:30 p.m. ET/PT tells the story of the Katrina kids.
"Katrina has shown these kids that it can all be gone in a moment, but
through their hardship the children of New Orleans have learned what
they're made of," said Ellerbee. "We must not forget these kids, or ignore
them, or neglect them. We must, in fact, honor them."
In Children of the Storm, kids share their reasons for returning to a
city once known for its music, food and history, now known for its
destruction, poverty and mountainous piles of trash-and their reactions to
what it's like to be back. We hear from kids like Erica, who lives in a
FEMA trailer in what was once her front yard, but says she still feels far
from home and we meet Clive, who takes us on a tour of the lower 9th ward,
where he used to live, and talks about a life that's forever changed.
With 80% of public schools in New Orleans still closed, many kids have
been forced to bounce from state to state, and school to school, some kids
even missing up to five months of classes. We will hear from some of these
kids as they share with us their experiences and give insight into the
difficulties of learning while on the move.
Ten months after the storm, there are kids in New Orleans who cry when
it starts to rain but, there are also people trying to help them. Groups
such as Ya-Ya (Young Aspirations/Young Artists), an organization which is
working to give kids a voice through-art, music and poetry are helping kids
tell their stories, hopes and fears. If their poems are not generally
happy, they are very real.
Not surprisingly, kids across the country have banned together and are
doing what they can to help too. We meet students from The National Relief
Network in Flint, Michigan, who took a bus to New Orleans to help gut
houses. Also, we meet the Katrina Krewe, made up of volunteers from New
Orleans, including kids, who have come together to clean up the mountains
of trash still found around New Orleans.
The children of New Orleans have seen and suffered loss. In the past
year many of them have learned more about life, death-and everything in
between- than some grownups will learn, ever. They are survivors and
through their stories they inspire us all.
Nick News, celebrating its 15th year, is the longest-running kids' news
show in television history, and has built its reputation on the respectful
and direct way it speaks to kids about the important issues of the day. In
2005, it won the Emmy for Outstanding Children's Programming for its show,
From the Holocaust to the Sudan. In 1994, the entire series, Nick News, won
the Emmy for Outstanding Children's Programming. In 1998, "What Are You
Staring At?" a program about kids with physical disabilities, won the Emmy
for Outstanding Children's Programming. In 2002, "Faces of Hope: The Kids
of Afghanistan," won the Emmy for Outstanding Children's Programming. In
2004, two Nick News Specials, "The Courage to Live: Kids, South Africa and
AIDS" and "There's No Place Like Home," a special about homeless kids in
America, were both nominated for the Outstanding Children's Programming
Emmy. In fact, Nick News has received more than 20 Emmy nominations. Nick
News, produced by Lucky Duck Productions, is also the recipient of two
Peabody Awards, including a personal one given to Ellerbee for her
coverage, for kids, of the President Clinton investigation; a Columbia
duPont Award; and more than a dozen Parents' Choice Awards.
Nickelodeon, in its 27th year, is the number-one entertainment brand
for kids. It has built a diverse, global business by putting kids first in
everything it does. The company includes television programming and
production in the United States and around the world, plus consumer
products, online, recreation, books, magazines and feature films.
Nickelodeon's U.S. television network is seen in more than 90 million
households and has been the number- one-rated basic cable network for more
than ten consecutive years. Nickelodeon and all related titles, characters
and logos are trademarks of Viacom Inc. (NYSE: VIA, VIA.B).
SOURCE Nickelodeon
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Joanna Roses, +1-212-846-7326, or Thamar
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