When plans were announced to build a new mosque and Islamic cultural center in New York some people were outraged, and this was more than bigotry and anti-Islamic sentiment. The controversy came over the proposed site…just two blocks from ground zero. Opponents said it was insensitive, and a disgrace to those that died on 9/11. Supporters said it was time to heal those wounds and pointed to the Constitutional right to freedom of religion. Either way, this house of worship has turned into a house of controversy and one that has both sides very fired up.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_UvCKkXVsyM[/youtube]

As a part of the CUNY/CBNS 60 Minutes Bootcamp, York College Communications Technology and Journalism students joined together to create “House of Controversy.” A serious look into the purposed building of a Multicultural Center/Mosque near NYC’s Ground Zero.

About The CUNY 60 Minutes Bootcamp

Take a diverse group of aspiring broadcast and journalism students. Immerse them in a rigorous, broadcast news production experience. Insist on high professional standards. Stress ethics. And produce broadcast-quality news magazine pieces–in two weeks. This is the successful formula for CUNY/ CBS TV Boot Camp, an innovative seminar that has established a national model for introducing students from under-represented communities to intensive broadcast news training at the college level. Handed cameras and editing gear, student teams find, research, report, shoot and edit “60 Minutes”-style stories. These teams have delivered extraordinary segments, taking on serious issues and producing gritty, often shocking pieces. They’ve captured on screen youth gangs and wheelchair-bound kids upended by street violence, exposed hardships facing gay kids attending public high schools, and taken cameras into New York’s waters where ravenous microorganisms are eating away at our urban infrastructure. For the broadcast news industry, these students of The City University of New York offer a remarkable combination of skill, achievement and diversity. They are eager to bring their voices to the newsrooms of tomorrow. TV Boot Camp was created by “60 Minutes” senior editor Warren Lustig, a CUNY alumnus, University Senior Vice Chancellor Jay Hershenson and University Director of Communications Michael Arena, a professor at the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism. Now approaching 10 years of service, CUNY/ CBS TV Boot Camp has trained nearly 200 students and helped to inspire TV news careers. One student called it “a test of character and an intensive learning experience” that will be “with me for the rest of my life.”