Category: Blog 2026

My second day in the program gave me a new outlook on the possibilities and perspectives within media and journalism. The pep talk and lede writing lesson in the morning, and our many guest speakers in the afternoon, such as George Giokas, J.D. Allen, Frank Posillico, and Rick Ricioppo, opened a world of new insights into this dynamic industry.

One particular session that I enjoyed was the podcast with J.D. Allen. J.D. Allen is a podcaster for Higher Ground, and has worked with SBU helping aspiring journalists like me find the connections between journalism and multimedia, and how they work together to create a podcast. I also learned the factors that create an engaging podcast including characters, interviews, and background audio. This allows the audience to imagine the scenes and stories, truly highlighting the power and importance of audio.

Today was packed with valuable information, and I’m eager to put everything I learned today into practice tomorrow!

By Jonnae Greene, Baldwin High School

My first day at the Greene Institute was very confusing, but definitely the most interesting event of this summer. Moving into a dorm that I’ve never seen before is anxiety-inducing and nerve-wracking, but it was really fun in a way.

Finding the dorm was the hardest part. My aunt took at least 10 loops before my friend, Angie, sent me her location. Other than that, everything has been nice. Learning how to type in the Greene Gazette website was nice; the small tutorial Frank gave was easy, and he made a reference to Superman/Clark Kent. That lowkey made my day.

These Apple computers they’re letting us use are really nice and seem very fancy.

Other then that, the food we ate wasn’t the best, but the ice cream was overly good. I accidentally put too much, and my friend Kayci did the same, which ended with us throwing out the ice cream we didn’t get to finish.

When I got to my dorm, I realized I had no roommate. Well, at least in my own room. There’s these two sweet girls who are in the room next to me; my first conversation with them was extremely awkward.

I had to ask if they knew how to turn on the shower. Which to me, was honestly embarrassing in a way. I asked them, then they tried and realized it didn’t work for them either. I asked these three sweet girls and noticed they were also looking for an adult, so right after that I went back and asked my friend Angie.

She tried to turn her own bathrooms shower on and ended up getting herself wet, falling onto the floor along with turning the shower on which was really funny.

Besides that small dilemma, I’m glad I’ve gotten out of my comfort zone to meet new people. Hopefully it’ll get better as the week goes by.

By Yennifer Soriano, Hempstead High School

I woke up at five in the morning with the need to go back to bed, but instead, I decided to stay up for an hour and read what was happening in my community.

I lied. I’d never do that, but today I realized how much journalism is the glue in a community. Newspapers aren’t something you see very often, but inside of Hempstead High School, there is a newspaper club. One of the speakers who came today told us about how newspaper outlets were dying and how some communities don’t have news outlets.

That reminded me of News 12, which tells us literally everything going on inside Hempstead. It reminded me of how lucky I am; having an opportunity like that is necessary to feel some weird connection with your community.

All of that to say the speakers that came in today have actually affected my perspective on journalism.

The first speaker had told us about her life and how she was practically born into the media literacy side of the world. She told us that she had went through several historical moments that needed a journalist, which opened my mind alot.

Imagine if there were no journalists during 9/11, or during wars ongoing today, or so many other historical events. People wouldn’t know ANYTHING.

But either way, my second day was nice. The food was rather average, nothing life-changing. Its nice to have a selection. I don’t have any thoughts besides that, the food wasn’t really something to note.

The fries were really good, but then again you can’t really mess up fries. Same with the pasta.

Other then the food, I’m forever grateful I get to be here and have this opportunity as its extremely fun to meet these new people and meet these journalists.

— Yennifer Soriano, Hempstead High School

During my second day at the Robert W. Greene Summer Institute for High School Journalists, the coordinators of the program had a seemingly endless amount of activities planned for us to do. From learning the structure of an article and how to start a podcast to how to use a professional camera, this day was packed with what I love most about journalism: the range of creativity. Journalism comes in many different forms, such as videography, photography, broadcasting and of course, writing.

We were also given the chance to go outside and snap a few shots of Stony Brook’s campus with our teammates. Sometimes words are not enough to describe nature’s beauty.

— Yasmin Bardales, Hempstead High School

Please. Listen to me. I would be such a good stage manager. I did it today, and it was so awesome, and Marcy McGinnis herself told me I would do good. I know my high school stage manager program doesn’t exactly work like that but it’s FINE. I could do it, let me.

I didn’t actually go on TV. I didn’t really want to. I don’t have a desire to be on TV. I wanted to stage manage because I’m already on Miller Place’s backstage crew. I’m so good at it. Tell them to let me stage manage. Literally everyone that was in the room said I was doing good! Please. New career path just dropped in my life.

I like it! It’s the perfect mix of bossing people around and dealing with technology. I’m good at both of those things! Everyone get in the comments and tell them to let me stage manage.

Also. The cafe had vegetarian pasta today. Alfredo. So, so good. It was beautiful. Pasta is one of my favorite foods. Ask any vegetarian. We’re all constantly eating pasta.

It’s been a good day so far! I’m having fun. Movie night was canceled because of rain. That made me sad, but it’s okay. I’m okay about it now. I got over it.

Also while I have you check out this awesome photo of me Myles took like two days ago.

— Asher Squires, Miller Place High School

Macaroni salad, mac ‘n cheese, and a salad with balsamic vinaigrette were the three non-dessert items I could eat at the buffet-style dinner tonight. Not to say they were bad at all, they were not.

This is just how it tends to be as a vegetarian, not to mention how I’m a super picky eater. Dinner and lunch tend to be harder. Breakfast is easy, since most buffet styles have some type of pancake/waffle maker, or cereal.

Mostly, I can’t complain about food. Mac n’ Cheese is in fact, one of my favorite foods. Salad is always good, obviously. The balsamic vinaigrette I make is obviously better than theirs, but you know. They had a good amount of options at the salad bar, actually. Including red onion, which is a option I don’t see a lot.

I am quite excited for breakfast tomorrow. I did see a waffle maker and cereal bar! Breakfast is probably my favorite meal of the day during the summer. During school years I eat two half frozen Uncrustables for breakfast every single day. It’s bad. But during summer, I wake up late and get to make my own breakfast, or I wake up late enough that it’s already lunch time, so breakfast becomes lunch, which means I can eat microwave ramen for breakfast. It’s really healthy and all that jazz.

(Pictures by Briana Dworsak and Haru Dukanac)

Today was an interesting first day at the Robert W. Greene Summer Institute! New atmosphere, different people, and a week full of activities! The drive to Stony Brook University was easygoing, and meeting my roommate was even better. Getting settled in moved along quickly. The newsroom was a sight to behold, I felt like I was in the right place. The array of computers, and the occasional sound of the air conditioning weirdly excited me for the next few days I would be spending there. Later in the evening, my new friends and I walked to the dining hall for dinner. Soon after, we spent the rest of this exciting night dedicated to making bonds with the other students in the program. This first day definitely made me ecstatic for the next five days ahead!

– Briana Dworsak, Baldwin High School

Monday, Day 2, was the first real day of the Greene Institute.

After waking up and getting treated with some glorious breakfast, the rest of the Greene Team and I were shuffled to the newsroom again.

There, we got introduced to and briefed on a whole bunch of different concepts: podcasting, how to write a good lede, how to shoot b-roll for TV news, etc. It gave us a great primer on how to write, record, and film in the best possible way to keep and attract an audience.

I got grouped up with three girls: Angie, May, and Yasmin. We got a camera and for a couple minutes, we strolled outside the building where the newsroom is and took some photos of the trees and a fountain, learning from what we were taught.

After eating dinner and spending some more time in the newsroom, my group mates and I went to the lounge in our dorm building, and were introduced to our two assignments by our group leader, whose name is Joie Tyrrell.

They’re pretty cool. The first one is for Able News, a news source for disabled people in the NYC area, and it’s a Q&A for a sort of AirBNB service for disabled people. And the second is a video package about an exhibit at the Paul W. Zuccaire Gallery, an art gallery on the Stony Brook campus.

Can’t wait to get started with making a proper journalistic piece of work! See you tomorrow, God Bless, Greg.

— Gregory Valestin, Brooklyn Technical High School

Tuesday, July 28th — the third day of the Greene Institute. I can confidently say that this has been my favorite day so far. We started off the lesson with a special guest, Maya Brown. Maya Brown is a new journalist who dedicated 10 years of her life to get to her goals, sharing her stories. And afterwards, even if we were focusing on our stressful, and hard to organize work in the beginning — the same work due this Friday — we ended the stressful work just by getting on the Stony Brook bus.

On the bus, we headed to the Newsday headquarters in Melville, New York. The ride was about forty minutes. And it was like a whole other world when we stepped inside. There were many televisions, broadcasting the different work that the journalists working at Newsday accomplish. I learned that Newsday is the most successful, local news in Long Island. And after hearing advice, thoughts, and opinions of each different workers there, we headed to different places inside Newsday. There was a podcast room, generated by Chat GPT; and the room even had the infamous Joe Mele, a TikTok star. Afterwards, we headed to where reporters, and weather forecasters, sit or stand. It felt like a lucid dream just standing in the room. After the Newsday headquarters, we packed up our stuff after taking a group photo, and headed off to Central Islip for the Ducks game.

After making it to the stadium, my other teammates and I walked around inside the stadium for a little while. We we grabbed our delicious food, and watched the game. I ate a hotdog, popcorn, and an iced Coca Cola. The best thing wasn’t that the Ducks were winning this game, but it was that I spent it with my teammates.

— Heily Sandoval, Northport High School