A couple of months ago I entered the Kid Reporter contest for the Time For Kids magazine. You can read about it here:

http://www.timeforkids.com/krcontest

You get to be a reporter for them for a year. They send you places and you get to meet really neat people. One kid got to report on the Westminster Dog Show. That convinced me that I should enter the contest. I interviewed my mom’s friend Jason Cook. I added pictures of the kids performing and one of Jason and his kids. Let me know what you think.

Oh yeah, the one thing I did not do, but now I know you HAVE to do, is send a copy of the article to the person you interview. I will always remember to do this in the future.

You can read the article I sent in below:

Center Stage

By Piper Alexis Mahoney

Charles Jason Cook, age 45, who goes by Jason Cook is an English Literature and Journalism teacher. As a teacher, Mr. Cook passes knowledge on to young students. He hopes to impact there writing ability and much more. Mr. Cook has been a teacher for 23 years but he does more than just teach English Literature classes. Mr. Cook hosts a student program at his school, in Prince Georges County Public Schools, Maryland. The program is named Colours and has been operating for 23 years beginning in 1992. The students came up with the name because it represents the diverse backgrounds of the students in the group. The group’s website is www.coloursprogram.org.

By creating the organization for students in grades 3-12, he hopes to inspire children to grow up and teach others through Arts leadership. Mr. Cook teaches children how to report truthfully about real life situations through writing plays, poems, songs, or on his student online newspaper PG Student Press. You can read some of the student written articles on the PG Student Press blog at https://pgstudentpress.wordpress.com. Some of his favorite authors are Mark Twain and Richard Bach.

As much as he enjoys teaching, he believes children are under too much stress from tests given to them. He says, “We still need tests, just not as many, and they need to be created by people who know how to put children first.” Mr. Cook lives in Maryland, with his two children, Keilyn, 13, and William, 8.  He has lived in Maryland 26 years and traveled there to attend college at the University of Maryland. He was born and raised in Miami, Florida. When he retires he would like to move back to Florida and relax near the ocean and still be involved in Arts Education for children.