FareStart: the use of video -- story telling

      Here is a video of FareStart made and posted on youtube. It is the most popular video, but it has only 2600 views. It showed about lives of 6 FareStart graduate students'. It looks like a documentary, but it is really a commercial. After i watched this video, i don't have any strong feelings toward this. It is a long video, about 7 minutes. It is almost too positive all the way from the beginning to the end, almost unreal to me. Every students come to this program, and suddenly their lives changed. I also realized people don't like things that are too flat or cheesy. There are 6 people's stories in it, but for me all the stories are the same, no personality involved. If there are too much cheese in it, people will know it.

      My suggestion would be focus on one graduate in each video. FareStart should tell a truly touching and real story. From the beginning, what is his or her life was like. It is okay for a homeless person or disabled person to depress or have negative feelings. The main point is how they can get rid of those negative attitude. We have to show people, that FareStart is the one who made the change.  The program is not easy. How his or her attitude started to change in this program.Maybe the instructor and students have conflict at first, but the instructor never gave up. Something like that. The video need to use details to show the change points and the interviewer should speak his or her true feelings. In a word, the video should not be too perfect all the way. it need some conflicts and downsides to make it real and convincing. 

     Speaking of story telling, in class we mention the show undercover boss. It is particularly touching because it related to most of the people; many people have worked for a minims wage job, they can all be connected. So, my idea for FareStart is to create a show that can connect with people and inspire people. the characters in the show are selected from homeless people who are on the street or from the shelter. They are not only unemployed but also unemployable. He might has full of facial hair, unibrow, messy clothes. He is invited to FareStart to learn culinary skills. FareStart provide him food and shelter. He might don't want to learn this, try to get back to street, fight with others or instructor, etc. Fully shows his personality right there. Until he made a friend at FareStart, he started to make progress. Along the way, each progress he made can be hard. There are many stories they can tell. After completing the program, before he is going to a job interview, FareStart can do the makeover for him: shave his beard, fix his eyebrow, put on him a new suit. And it turn out that he is a very cute and handsome guy. At the end he find a good job. That is a story that can inspire people. Especially in today's economy, many people lost their jobs; they are upset about Wall Street, lack of motivation to find a new job. FareStart's video can give them another motivation. If they can do it, you can do it as well.