According to the News Literary Project, an overwhelming number of teenagers—around 84%—describe the news with negative descriptions: overwhelming, chaotic, biased, confusing, and depressing. Motivated by this upsetting statistic, Emily Beltramo (‘28) founded The Change Generation, an organization working to negate the fear associated with the news today.

“It feels like nowadays, every piece of news feels so depressing: someone’s dying, someone’s being arrested, there’s always some upsetting event,” Beltramo said.

Turning Concern Into Inspiration

Much of the media available to people strays from the simple facts, making it difficult for teenagers to form individual opinions. Beltramo focuses her page on identifying the undisputed facts, allowing everyone to gain personal perspectives.

“I think journalism and just knowing the facts is an extremely important component of making sure that everyone’s voice is heard and that justice can be served,” Beltramo said.

Beltramo views awareness of the world as a responsibility, exposing herself to the graphic injustices and realities on the news.

“There’s been a lot of unprecedented events in my generation’s time, and that’s what we’ve been growing up with. I just see a lack of respect and morals and dignity, and accountability in our government, and that is extremely upsetting to me,” Beltramo said.

Faced with the reality of the world around her, Beltramo was inspired to start her Instagram page to help support and inform young adults during this time of constant change and extremity.

“In general, just the current state of the world and the US especially, has just  triggered me to feel like I need to take some kind of action to feel like I’m doing something,” said Beltramo.

One of the key causes behind Beltramo’s organization is the importance of unbiased news. Social media often biases the majority of news consumption toward one side or the other, making the news feel overwhelming. However, Beltramo acknowledges that she maintains a relative bias, but by just putting out the facts, she’s working to make her content merely informative, letting viewers decide what to think. 

“I definitely consider myself biased if I’m being honest, but I will try to make my content non-biased. It’s really important to me that people are getting unbiased news, at least mostly unbiased,” said Beltramo.

Knowledge Is Power

In order to play one’s part in one’s community, it is important to understand and pay attention to the

news of today.

“We owe it to ourselves to be educated. We know we owe it to ourselves to know what’s happening in our world so we can make our own decisions,” Beltramo said.

Despite fear and uncertainty, community leaders like Beltramo advise others who wish to make an impact to focus on what they care about.

“So the most I can say is to lead with love,” Beltramo said.

Supporting The Community

Owning the page is no easy feat. Although Beltramo is an advocate for awareness, she acknowledges the necessity to balance one’s own wellness with keeping informed.

“I’m a big advocate for mental health—I have struggles with my own mental health…and honestly, sometimes the news is extremely upsetting and depressing to me, even when being in a good place, like I am now,” Beltramo said, “Sometimes I just need to turn off the news because I try as hard as I can to keep myself informed. But at the end of the day, I need to come first so I can help other people and achieve my goals of like helping other people to understand things.”

Beltramo’s desire to help people led her to start this project, one that supports and empowers teens.

“My goal since I was little, with whatever I do in my life in general, not just what I do for work,  but what I do to take action as a person, is to have an impact on people or make people feel something, ideally positive,” said Beltramo said.

When starting this project, Beltramo didn’t have an end goal for where she wanted to take this organization, and thought this was an issue. Now, Beltramo has realized that her passion and drive will guide her in the right direction, no matter what.

“And if I’m putting my heart, soul, blood, sweat, and tears into it, then how can you go wrong?” Beltramo said.