PORT HAWKESBURY - A unique partnership with a new senior-oriented pilot project has Telile Community Television bringing the large 60-and-over population of the Strait Area a closer connection to issues that impact them.
Late in September, Nova Scotia's Minister of Seniors and Long-Term Care, Barbara Adams, came to the Strait Area Campus of the Nova Scotia Community College (NSCC) to confirm that the Port Hawkesbury campus was one of two chosen to host a Centre Of Rural Aging and Health (CORAH) for the coming year. Originally given a test run at the NSCC's Wolfville campus in the Annapolis Valley, the CORAH concept is now in its fifth month of operation at the NSCC campuses in Port Hawkesbury and Shelburne.
Adam Cooke, who works at Telile via the Local Journalism Initiative (LJI), was on hand for the official unveiling of the Strait Area CORAH facility and also followed up on the story through a feature interview with project coordinator Michele MacPhee, who previously served as the Seniors Safety Coordinator for Richmond County.
These efforts have paved the way for the next stage of Telile's partnership with CORAH - namely, filming presentations given to (and occasionally, by) seniors on issues that matter to them, such as phone-scam avoidance, proper nutrition and sleep habits, and the importance of caregivers in rural Nova Scotia. Cooke has already filmed and formatted a presentation by Dr. Michelle Greenwell on proper sleep habits for seniors, and was slated to film a follow-up presentation by the Caregivers Association of Nova Scotia before a record snowstorm walloped Cape Breton Island and northeastern Nova Scotia in early February. However, Cooke will be on hand once this presentation is rescheduled.
Given Telile's longstanding reputation as a provider of programming for Richmond County's senior population and the dependence many seniors have on traditional media such as community television, the station's reputation preceded itself by the time Cooke arrived at the NSCC Strait Area Campus to do special features on the launch of CORAH and set up his camera to capture a full CORAH session that attracted 40 people from across the region on January 30.
"They do a great job of coming out to the community, finding out what's happening and keeping people informed," said MacPhee as she praised Telile in the run-up to Dr. Greenwell's address on sleep habits.
"We're happy to have them here."
Add new comment
About LJI
LJI Impact is the section of commediaportal.ca where the journalists and their organizations participating in CACTUS' Local Journalism Initiative can share their greatest successes.
Through the written stories, photos and videos you see in the LJI Impact section, you'll be able to read first hand accounts about how the presence of a community journalist is making a difference in communities across Canada through the Local Journalism Initiative and the Community Media Portal.
The Community Media Portal is a gateway to the audio-visual media created by community media centres across Canada. These include traditional community TV and radio stations, as well as online and new media production centres.
Community media are not-for-profit production hubs owned and operated by the communities they serve, established both to provide local content and reflection for their communities, as well as media training and access for ordinary citizens to the latest tools of media production, whether traditional TV and radio, social and online media, virtual reality, augmented reality or video games.
The Community Media Portal has been funded by the Local Journalism Initiative (the LJI) of the Department of Canadian Heritage, and administered by the Canadian Association of Community Television Users and Stations (CACTUS) in association with the Fédération des télévisions communautaires autonomes du Québec (the Fédération). Under the LJI, over 100 journalists have been placed in underserved communities and asked to produce civic content that underpins Canadian democratic life.
