This Teenage Life (Podcast)

Title: This Teenage Life 

Host: Various

Dates Active: 2019-2024

Created By: Independent. Partnerships with Arizona State University, Brown University’s Swearer Center, Center for Digital Thriving, Connected Wellbeing Impact Studio, Headstream, UNICEF USA, XQ Institute

Category: Mental Health & Wellness

Episode Title: Interfaith Club (from 10/16/24)

Plot Summary: This Teenage Life is a podcast hosted by teens that is centered on teens’ experiences, struggles and triumphs in their daily lives. The topics are wide ranging, and the latest episode was called “Interfaith Club.” It was hosted by Easha and Daniel who both attend the same high school. Easha is Muslim and Daniel is Orthodox Jewish. When they were both starting high school, they felt uncomfortable expressing their respective religions at school. They found that they were both big fans of Christmas movies and decided to found the Interfaith Club at their high school together. It is a space that allows everyone for a free discussion about aspects of their various religions with others. They have found that, even though they may have different religions backgrounds, many in the group have similar experiences navigating their way through high school. The club allows them to view people as they authentically are and share their similarities rather than their differences.

Quality of the media: Even though this podcast does not appear to be produced by any of the “major” podcast distributors, it is professional sounding and easy to listen to and follow along. The two teens were interesting and provided a lot of information in a short amount of time.

Opinion: This was my first time listening to this podcast and it was very good. Looking at the episode history, the podcast discusses a wide array of subjects – examples are Thoughts On Creative Careers, Adulting After High School, Navigating School Drama and Rumors, You’re Not Alone in Feeling Lonely, and Religious & LGBTQ+ (“being queer while also living in a religious community”). These two teens, Daniel and Easha, were very well spoken and it was nice to hear how they had created this club on their own, and the successes they have seen with it. This is a well-produced podcast, and I would definitely be interested in listening to some more of the subjects they have discussed in past episodes.

Library Program: Most of the episodes are between 15 and 35 minutes long. So, a perfect library program for this podcast would be to gather a group of teens on a weekly or bi-weekly basis for an hour-long meeting/club. The group could listen to one or two of the episodes (depending on the length of the episodes) and they discuss what they just heard. Each episode synopsis that I have read is something that would resonate with most, if not all, teens. So, getting a group together for an open discussion would be a wonderful use of this podcast.