Having a dream is one thing. Pursuing it is another.

Leah Stacy and Pete Wayner, 2012 alumni, and their good friend, Kevin Kennedy, have set out on a road trip from Rochester, N.Y., to Austin, Texas, telling the stories of people pursuing their versions of the American Dream. Doing this is theirs.

Together, they call themselves Team Bly, and on Sept. 14, The Bly Project officially launched. Through travel and immersion journalism, Stacy, Wayner and Kennedy hope to craft public discussions and personal reflections in order to generate social good, according to a Sept. 13 press release.

The first question Team Bly asks people is: “What is your version of the American Dream?” Stacy said. The follow-up question is: “What are you doing now to pursue that?”

“We ask somebody who seems interesting to us,” Stacy said. “From there, they kind of decide if they’re an American Dreamer.”

This media startup gets its name from the first immersion journalist, Elizabeth Cochran — also known as Nellie Bly — who checked herself into a madhouse for 10 days, feigning insanity to reveal the maltreatment of patients, according to the press release.

Stacy and Wayner said courses they took in the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications and in the School of Information Studies inspired them to pursue this startup. One such class was Newhouse professor Bob Lloyd’s MNO 601: “Principles: Business, History, and the Ethics of Journalism.”

“(Lloyd) would say the job of a journalist is to go over the hill and see what’s going on over there,” Wayner said. “Then, report back to the people on their side of the hill.”

That’s what Team Bly is doing through immersion journalism, which attracted them because it allows for face-to-face contact with people and involvement with their stories.

Team Bly was in Zuccotti Park in New York City — where Occupy Wall Street protesters set up camp in 2011 — on Monday, Sept. 17, the anniversary of the movement. A lot of protesters and police were there, Wayner said.

“You could call one of the organizers … but we wouldn’t have been able to get the feel for it,” he said. “We wouldn’t have really been able to get the whole story unless we went there, which we did.”

The three seek people of different ages, ethnicities and economic backgrounds, Stacy said.  In New York, Wayner said, they interviewed in an Upper West Side apartment, a park and everywhere in between.

From the looks of The Bly Project’s website, Twitter and Facebook — all where Stacy, Wayner and Kennedy have been posting updates on their journey — it appears as though Team Bly has already interviewed Aurora, Colo., shooting victim and 2012 alumnus Stephen Barton, and President and Publisher of USA Today Larry Kramer.

On Monday, Stacy, Wayner and Kennedy will arrive in Roanoke, Va., the fourth city of seven they will hit on their three-week trip before post-production begins. They plan to release a package of multimedia stories from each city.

Since January, they’ve raised more than $2,500 through a small grant, competition prize and freelance assignments that will cover travel and living costs, according to The Bly Project’s Kickstarter page. The additional funds they are raising will subsidize the cost of equipment and software required to produce the stories.

Wayner said using Kickstarter gave The Bly Project a chance to demonstrate its proof of concept early on. Within one week of fundraising, Stacy said, Team Bly had reached 50 percent of its goal.

As of 8 p.m. Sunday, $2,241 had been pledged of the $3,750 goal. But the project will only be funded if the entire goal is met by Wednesday, Oct. 3, just after noon.

What Wayner has enjoyed most through now has been talking to sources that are “very, very successful in terms of what most people would define as success,” he said, but discovering that “they’re still looking for something; they still have dreams.”

Stacy’s favorite part of the experience so far is that they’re actually doing it. People tell Team Bly that what they’re doing is very inspiring, she said, and she loves being able to tell stories of hope while giving other people hope that they can achieve their dreams.

In the planning stages, Wayner told Stacy something he believed to be true of The Bly Project’s purpose.

Said Wayner: “Every project needs a payoff, and I think ours is hope.”

Published on September 23, 2012 at 10:38 pm

Contact Cheryl: cjseligm@syr.edu | @CherylSeligman