NPR is thrilled to announce its first ever Student Podcast Challenge. Beginning January 1, 2019, teachers and students across the country will be able to turn their classrooms into production studios, their assignments into scripts, and their ideas into sound. Winning podcasts, one from grades five through eight and another from grades nine through 12, will be featured in segments on NPR's Morning Edition and All Things Considered later in the spring of 2019. 

Students and teachers participating in NPR's Student Podcast Challenge can take a topic, a lesson, or a unit they're learning about, and turn it into a podcast between three and 12 minutes long. NPR's Education Team is providing training materials and resources — how to use a smartphone to record audio, how to conduct an interview, audio storytelling tips and tricks — for both teachers and students. To help classrooms get started, NPR will also share suggested, but not required prompts, along with a set of criteria that judges will use to pick winning podcasts.

"Public media belongs to everyone. We need to hear the concerns, ideas, and perspectives of young people, and what better way than to give space for them tell their own stories, in their own voices," said Steve Drummond, executive producer of NPR Ed and Code Switch.

The contest will be open for entries from January 1 through March 31, 2019. The winners from each age group will be notified in April. In addition to having their work featured on national NPR programs, NPR journalists will also visit winning classes before the end of the school year to report features on students who created the winning podcasts. Other standout podcasts may be featured online, on other NPR programs, or on local Member stations. 

Getting Started Resources:

Starting Your Podcast: A Guide For Students

Teaching Podcasting: A Curriculum Guide for Educators

Need some inspiration? Check out GPB's new podcast The Credits. In this podcast, host Kalena Boller goes on set to meet the people who work in Georgia's multi-billion dollar film industry. Kalena is an Atlanta-based location manager on major film and television projects. This podcast is her love letter to the hardworking people who work alongside her.

Visit the Student Podcast Challenge website to learn more about how the contest works, where to begin, the rules and meet the judges.