AMELIA — A student-made videotape that memorializes Brad Braughton, an Amelia High School graduate who died in Vietnam, has caught the attention of an educational advocacy group and might serve as a national model.

TIME ON THE AIR

The Brad Braughton Story airs on Anderson-Union Community Television 6:25 p.m. June 6 on Channel 24. (Channel numbers refer to channels on Warner converter boxes.) For information, call Anderson-Union Community Television, 474-3488.

        “This is the kind of project we'd like to see happening in all schools,” said Joe Nathan, director of the Center for School Change at the University of Minnesota. “It helps youngsters see relationships with what they're learning in school and what's happening in the world.”

        The center works with educators and others across the United States to increase student achievement, raise graduation rates and improve student attitudes toward learning.

        The 13-minute videotape, researched and produced by three Amelia seniors, has been airing on Anderson-Union Community Television the last month.

        The videotape is a project of Vicki Ciliberti's broadcasting class at Amelia High School in the West Clermont Local School District.

        “It just amazes me that 34 years later, Brad is still touching lives — I'm just so proud,” said Mr. Braughton's sister, Debbie Smith of Amelia, who is featured in the documentary.

        The video project was Mrs. Ciliberti's idea. She said she was shooting flag footage last fall for the pledge of allegiance for the school's Friday news show, Good Morning Amelia, when she noticed the plaque at the base of the flagpole at the soccer stadium.

        The plaque reads, “The Brad Braughton Memorial Field.”

        “Since I'm a 30-year teacher here, I remembered the touching story behind the memorial, but I realized that I was perhaps the only person in the school who did,” Mrs. Ciliberti said.

        “It struck me that this was a story that needed to be retold to this generation of students.”

        And so it was.

        A sergeant in the 101st Army Airborne Division, Mr. Braughton died Jan. 31, 1968, the result of “friendly fire.”

        A 1966 graduate, he named Amelia High School the beneficiary of his $10,000 military life insurance policy. The videotape includes interviews with Mr. Braughton's friends and family and footage of him and his buddies in Vietnam. It tells about Mr. Braughton's life at school and in the military.

        “We didn't expect it to be as effective as it was, because history doesn't usually capture the attention of students,” said senior Lacy Pez, 18, who worked on the videotape along with Matt Smith, 18, and Lauren Freedman, 18.

        “But the day we aired it (March 1), teachers reported that all classes were silent.”

        Added Matt: “What really got to me was the sister's interview and reading the letters Brad wrote.”

        Mr. Nathan said he would like Mrs. Ciliberti to work with the center on training other teachers to do similar projects. Mrs. Ciliberti said she is flattered but undecided about the offer.

        “This project brings together academic skills with very important connections to the broader community,” he said. “It also made a very important contribution to the community by bringing alive historical events.”

        Recently, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation gave the University of Minnesota center a $3.9 million grant to convert large public high schools into “small schools of choice” in the Cincinnati area and elsewhere.

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