After 8 years in Whitesburg, KY, the ACP Workshop has relocated to Lewisburg, West Virginia where 19 Western Kentucky University photojournalism students arrived on March 5 to begin a week of storytelling in the Pocahontas and Greenbreier county region. This year the workshop is partnering with High Rocks, an award-winning leadership program for girls between 13-25 years old in the region. We are working out of Dogwood Studio in Lewisburg, run by several Americorps volunteers and High Rocks staff members who teach video storytelling to the girls. We’ll be doing some partnerships between the WKU university and high school students here.

Today, our students spent the morning hours story hunting and getting the lay of the land until we all convened for a meeting with High Rocks director Sarah Riley and several staff members who led a discussion about visual stereotyping in Appalachia. In the discussion, the students looked at how they thought they’d be perceived by the community here, and what preconceptions they have of the community. Through that discussion, it is our hope that we can accurately, fairly and honestly document the stories of the people in the region, without falling into the traps of visual stereotypes that have persisted for decades.