RTDNA - EXCELLENCE IN WRITING
MOUNTAIN WEST NEWS BUREAU
BRIEF DESCRIPTION
Rachel Cohen is an accomplished, talented reporter. But she’s also a very strong writer, and this trio of very different stories compellingly showcases her writing chops. In particular, these samples show her ability to move seamlessly between scene tape, descriptions, and exposition to carry a story forward.
STORIES
SCRIPTS
CELL PHONE
Intro
Many school districts are conducting an experiment this year. They’re outright banning cell phones. The Mountain West News Bureau’s Rachel Cohen takes us to one Colorado high school to see how it’s going.
Body
It's the third day of school at Doherty High in Colorado Springs. 1,700 teenagers file through the doors as security guard Lonny Barrett checks IDs.
**good morning, thank you**
This year, he’s also inspecting cell phones.
**Phone ID, Can I see your phone**
According to a new policy, students need to put their phones away all day inside special pouches.
Barrett checks each one.
And, only a few minutes into the morning rush, he’s found a pouch that’s suspicious.
LB “What is this? This isn't a phone. This is a box of extra gum, how much do you want to bet**
He hands the student the gum stuffed inside in place of a phone. Barrett says this happens a few times each morning.
LB "They'll put like empty cases, or even like an old broken phone that doesn't even work anymore, they'll try to put that in there and sneak it past us… it's been entertaining."
Many kids simply tell him they left their phones at home. He has his doubts.
LB “You don’t have yours?”
So, he reminds them there are consequences if they're caught with their phones. Standing nearby is the principal, Hillary Hienton.
HH Wait, where’s your phone? Is it in here?
She explains to me how the system works. The gray fabric pouches are designed by a company called Yondr. They magnetically lock so the phones are trapped all day. To unlock them requires visiting a magnet station by the front office.
HH “You just hit one of the side of the Yondr pouch to the magnet..”
The pouches cost the district more than $300,000.
But Hienton says rampant cell phone use reached a point where doing something felt necessary.
HH "In classrooms, it turned into a lot of power struggles. Students didn't want to put their phones away or give up their phones."
School leaders also cite the research showing phones and social media are harmful for youth mental health.
Lots of districts around the region agree. This year, schools in the Salt Lake City, Las Vegas and Boise areas are declaring campuses and classrooms phone-free.
Others ditched them last year.
JF "This is the best policy change we've ever made in my career of 28 years."
Jim Foudy is a superintendent of a school district in Idaho. He says their ban has gone smoothly.
JF “We actually had hired a teacher who had a few different job offers, and said that he chose to work for Blaine County because this policy was in place.”
Back at Doherty High, students in Erin Ahnfeld's English class are passing around a ball of yarn. It’s a lesson about connections -- between each other and books they'll read.
Ahnfeld says he feels like he did when he began teaching before smartphones were everywhere.
EA "I think it's a courageous move."
In the first week, he's already noticed a difference. Last year, when he gave students a break between lessons, they'd pick up their phones.
EA "This year, every time I give them a five minute break, they just talk to each other, so that makes the feel and community in a classroom way more powerful."
EH "I hate this new phone system a lot."
Eli Howard is a junior.
He doesn’t think the policy will make students pay attention in class.
And he worries about safety. Earlier in the morning, the school was put on a "hold" during a potential emergency. It turned out to be nothing. But Howard was scared.
EH "I was like, ‘Dude what if there's someone in here and I can’t – my mom and dad – I can't talk to them.”
Other students like Dante Click say they understand where the school is coming from.
DC "I don't think adults are crazy for this one. Kids are definitely on their phone too much. But I think it's going to backfire on them."
Click says some kids are breaking the pouches.
And many ask Principal Hienton why the school is doing this to them.
HH "I say I care about you and I care about your education and I want to make sure that you have the tools and the skills and the competencies that are going to make you successful in life."
She says phones are a distraction from that success.
For the Mountain West News Bureau, I’m Rachel Cohen
GAY RODEO
Intro
Rodeos have long been a symbol of the American West, a tradition that’s been very gendered, macho and heterosexual … But there’s also a nearly 50-year tradition of gay rodeos, where different versions of Western cowboy culture are celebrated.
KUNC’s Rachel Cohen visited the longest-running gay rodeo, here in Colorado.
Body
Like at most rodeos, there’re a lot of blue jeans and cowboy hats at the National Western Complex in Denver. Country music is playing and contestants are competing in roping and barrel racing, fighting for first-place buckles and prize money.
But, at this rodeo, there’s also an event called Wild Drag.
JACKWELL "So we get the big cow, we get it across the first line, second line…
Alizae Roze Jackwell – that’s her drag name – is preparing to hop on a steer. She’s sporting a pink barbie dress with a blonde curly wig.
Wild Drag is a "camp" event special to the International Gay Rodeo circuit.
JACKWELL "See an old man in a very very rowdy-looking red wig with a black bow and a sparkly body con dress."
The first gay rodeo was thrown together in Reno, Nevada in 1976.
LGBTQ+ people could participate without fear of homophobia, says Nick Villanueva, a University of Colorado Boulder sports studies professor who wrote a book about gay rodeo.
VILLANUEVA "And that's part of the gay liberation movement of the 1970s, which was, well, if you don't want us, we'll create our own."
Colorado has held a gay rodeo every year since 1983. Others sprung up in Albuquerque, Los Angeles, Oklahoma City.
Candy Pratt grew up riding horses. She attended her first gay rodeo in Texas, after seeing a poster in a bar.
PRATT "I hadn't quite come out to my family yet but it was a place you could go and be openly gay. It was just a place of safety at the time.”
Plus, in the gay rodeo, women could participate in the rough stock events usually reserved for men.
She remembers hundreds of contestants, and 10,000 fans in rodeos that would run until midnight.
PRATT "There was so many people in the stands, when you'd turn the first barrel, they'd scream and it'd scare your horse across the arena."
But it wasn't always an easy ride. The groups faced more bigotry as the AIDS epidemic spread.
In Pratt's first year on the circuit, the rodeo finals in Reno were canceled by a district attorney.
Organizers, including in Colorado, had trouble booking arenas and contractors.
PRATT "We used to have to have a vet onsite or you’d have to have a shooer on site and we'd say this is for a gay rodeo and they'd say oh, no, not coming."
But they pulled together by raising money to address the AIDS crisis. Many found lifelong friends and belonging.
That's true for Villanueva, the CU Boulder professor, who competes himself. He says it's helped him get in touch with his rural upbringing while challenging the aspects of hyper-masculinity. He remembers roping a steer for the first time.
VILLANUEVA my husband was there and he just gave me a big hug and kiss on the cheek. And it was just something that you don't have to worry about what people in the stands are going to say or when you walk into the parking lot of the arena at night."
Still, he worries about declining attendance and whether the younger generation will get involved.
<<bring up horse noises>>
Kade Hiller, who’s 27, is about to race through a course of poles on a horse for the first time.
HILLER "I'm excited. I'm a little bit nervous."
He grew up in Haxtun, near the Nebraska border. He says today there are more accepting spaces for queer people, but gay rodeo still feels important, especially with rising anti-LGBTQ+ hate.
HILLER "No matter what happens, we're going to find a space to bring the horses together and bring the contestants together, and we're going to have a rodeo no matter what."
He's now on the board of the Colorado Gay Rodeo Association and says he wants to be a part of its future. Starting with the 50th gay rodeo, back in Reno next year.
In Denver, I’m Rachel Cohen, KUNC.
JAIL VOTING
REPORTER: Rachel Cohen
EDITOR: Michael deYoanna
10/30/24
JAIL VOTING FEATURE
Intro
Most of the roughly half a million people in jails across the country are eligible to vote in this election. But it’s not easy for many of those incarcerated people to cast their ballots. The Mountain West News Bureau’s Rachel Cohen reports on a Colorado effort that’s starting to turn that around.
Body
In a waiting room inside the Jefferson County jail, in the foothills West of Denver, a handful of incarcerated people in gray jumpsuits are filling out paperwork to vote.
<<ambi from waiting room>>
<<DEPUTY: Take this with you. Head on over to the deputy and they’ll let you in the other room. Alright man.>>
A sheriff’s deputy brings them to check in with election volunteers.
<<bring up Giddings ambi>>
Kyle Giddings looks at their case history and asks for their home addresses to see what ballots they should get.
GIDDINGS Ok, this guy’s good.
Nine years ago Giddings was behind bars in this very jail.
GIDDINGS I dealt with addiction for years and finally it all caught up to me.
It was the lead up to the 2016 election and he was chatting with his podmates.
GIDDINGS They just assumed they could never vote again. It was kind of in that moment that I realized that this is work that needs to be done.
If you’re convicted of a felony, the laws about when you can vote again vary by state. Many people in jail, though, are awaiting trial – they haven’t been found guilty – or they're serving misdemeanor sentences. So they’re still eligible.
About 900 people in the Jefferson County jail were allowed to vote in the 2022 midterms. But only 3 actually did.
GIDDINGS Your first thing you don't think of when your arrest is, Oh, I better update my voter registration form to make sure I get my ballot mailed to me.
The protocols for voting differ in each jail. You might need to ask deputies to help request a ballot or even for permission to use a pen.
So, the organization Giddings works for – The Colorado Criminal Justice Reform Coalition – helped pass a state law this year to wipe away the barriers. As a result, all county jails in the state have to set up polling places for at least six hours.
<<bring up ambi from voting room>>
<<alright, Mr. Rodriguez, you’re good to go man>>
In his pod, Jesus Rodriguez studied Colorado’s information booklet on ballot measures. But he wasn’t sure if he was eligible to cast a ballot.
So, he decided to find out.
RODRIGUEZ Somebody was like why don’t you just go check.
Turns out, he could. And, he had never voted before.
RODRIGUEZ I felt like my voice didn't matter because I've been incarcerated multiple times, I've lived a hectic lifestyle.
<<And your name? Jesus Rodriguez>>
Election officials give Rodriguez his ballot. He sits down at a gray desk with partitions on both sides.
<<And I’ll let you drop it in the box..
When he’s done, stuffs the ballot in a yellow bag
Very good, thank you guys.>>
He says he’s proud he voted.
RODRIGUEZ It made me feel really good to know my opinion matters in this situation.
But not everyone was initially on board with this new jail voting system. Colorado’s sheriffs association opposed it in the legislature.
Sam Zordel, the chair, says the association wasn’t trying to block anyone from voting.
ZORDEL We felt that it may create undue stress on certain agencies that didn’t need it because they were probably already allowing inmates to vote.
Very few jails around the country hold in-person voting. But more states are working to remove barriers. A new law in Nevada requires jails to have a plan. And advocates in Arizona are helping people determine their eligibility.
In the Jefferson County jail, the efforts are making a big difference. More than 300 inmates have voted so far in this election.
County Clerk Amanda Gonzalez oversees elections. She says this is progress, compared to the three people who voted two years ago.
GONZALEZ Our democracy is just so much stronger when we have everyone’s voices.
For the Mountain West News Bureau, I’m Rachel Cohen