The Princeton Nursery School : A Jewel For The Neighborhood
Produced by Princeton Nursery School & Scribe Video Center
Charlene Gilbert, Carlton Jones, Louis Massiah
Princeton Nursery School's mission is to provide a happy atmosphere for children at an affordable cost for their parents. Many of the school's parents are working, going to school, single -- or all three! The video chronicles the nursery school's history, as well as its daily routine and problems, including the recurring struggle to get loving but time-crunched parents to become -- and stay -- more involved.
The Princeton Nursery School was founded in 1929 to respond to the needs of local mothers looking to place their children in a caring and educational environment while they worked outside the home. Children at the Princeton Nursery School experience diversity and daily successes, develop healthy attitudes toward mistakes, assume responsibility for their personal space and materials, and encounter decision-making opportunities in the planning of their independent activities.
Charlene Gilbert is an independent documentary film and videomaker whose award winning film, Homecoming, Sometimes I am haunted by memories of red dirt and clay, premiered nationally on PBS and won the NBPC Prized Pieces Award for Best Documentary. Ms. Gilbert also co-authored, with Quinn Eli, a companion book to the film entitled Homecoming: The Story of African American Farmers published by Beacon Press. Her most recent documentary, Children Will Listen, premiered at the 2004 AFI Silverdocs Documentary Festival and had its national primetime PBS broadcast premiere in the fall of 2005. Her films and videos have been screened in numerous international and national festivals including: FESPACO, the Athens International Film and Video Festival and the Philadelphia Festival of World Cinema. Ms. Gilbert is also the recipient of several awards and fellowships including the Rockefeller Media Fellowship and the Kellogg National Leadership Fellowship award. She is currently working on a documentary project on Juvenile Justice and resides in Washington, DC where she is an associate professor in the School of Communication at American University.
Carlton Jones is a working videographer, a frequent Scribe video faciliator, and the head of Willow Grove, PA-based Carlton Jones Video.
Louis Massiah is the founder and executive director of Scribe. He also produced and directed the documentary works Louise Thompson Patterson: In Her Own Words, and W.E.B. Du Bois: A Biography in Four Voices. His award-winning works have been seen widely on public television and at international film festival and include Cecil B. Moore, an examination of the political leader and the Civil Rights struggle in Philadelphia, and A is for Anarchist, B is for Brown, on young political activists that emerged from a Hewlett video workshop at Haverford College.
Massiah's works for public television include Power! and A Nation of Law? for the award-winning series Eyes on the Prize II; <\em>Trash!, an encyclopedic look at trash as aspect of American culture; My Own Boss, exploring worker-owned and self-managed industries; and Digging Dinosaurs, profile of paleontologist, Jack Horner. In 2000, he served as senior production consultant for Robert Pinksy's Favorite Poem Project on the PBS' News Hour with Jim Lehrer. His current project, Haytian Stories, examines the complex relationship between the United States and Haiti over the last 200 years.
February 13, 1998 - Scribe Video Center Retrospective: Five on the Black Hand Side, Painted Bride Art Center (Philadelphia, PA)