LEARNING FORWARD
TMN partners with BPL to bring young creators to BIG BANG 2026
TMN Fellows Hasi Kapali and Emil Cinto alongside BPL Co-Executive Director Carlos Moreno.
Teens Media Network (TMN) has partnered with Big Picture Learning (BPL) to bring two young creators to cover BIG BANG 2026, the organization’s annual conference, taking place in Dallas, Texas, from July 21–24.
New York City | TMN Editorial
Big Picture Learning is an international network of schools and educators focused on student-centered learning, connecting education with young people’s interests, communities, and experiences beyond the classroom. BIG BANG brings together educators, young people, community leaders, and partners from across the network to exchange ideas and explore new approaches to learning.
From training to the field
Through the partnership, TMN welcomed two fellows: 18-year-old Hasi Capali from the Bronx, New York, and Emil Cinto from Chattanooga, Tennessee.
Neither Hasi nor Emil had previous experience in journalism or professional content creation. Before traveling to Dallas, they completed a month of training through TMN, including one-on-one mentorship and preparation for working in a real media environment.
The training followed a central principle of the TMN method: young creators develop their abilities by being trusted with real work, real responsibilities, and the opportunity to publish what they create.
Rather than preparing indefinitely before entering the field, the fellows learned the fundamentals and then put them into practice at BIG BANG.
“The experience was really fun, exciting, and nerve-racking at some points because it was something that took me out of my comfort zone.”
Hasi Kapali on her experience covering the BIG BANG conference in Dallas, TX.
Three days inside a real conference
In Dallas, Hasi and Emil covered the three-day conference alongside TMN founder and mentor Pablo Herrera, bringing more than 20 years of experience working in media and alongside young people across Europe, Latin America, and the United States.
Throughout the conference, the fellows photographed events, produced short-form content for social media, documented conversations and activities, and participated in long-form interviews with figures including Big Picture Learning Executive Director Andrew Frishman and Co-Executive Director Carlos Moreno, alongside other voices from the organization and the broader education landscape.
TMN Fellow Hasi Kapali and mentor Pablo Herrera interview BPL Co-Executive Director Carlos Moreno. Photo: Emil Cinto.
The conference became both their assignment and their learning environment.
Mistakes, unexpected situations, conversations with people they had never met, working with equipment, deciding what was worth documenting, asking questions, and producing material that would ultimately reach a real audience were all part of the experience.
TMN fellow Hasi Kapali interviews BPL Co-Executive Director Carlos Moreno.
Learning through real experience
The TMN Fellowship Program is built around a hands-on framework designed to help young creators gain confidence and begin navigating the creative industries naturally.
Fellows are placed at the center of real cultural and professional environments — including conferences, music events, and film festivals — where they can experience how media is actually produced while working within a supportive structure of mentorship and guidance.
“The goal is not to simulate professional experience. It is to create a safe framework in which young people can have that experience for real.”
Mentorship is fundamental to that process, but learning does not move in only one direction. Young creators bring their own perspectives, questions, cultural references, and ways of seeing the world into the newsroom. The relationship between mentor and creator becomes a two-way process of learning, experimentation, and discovery.
Young people share their experiences and reflections at BIG BANG 2026 in Dallas, TX.
A shared approach to learning
The partnership between Teens Media Network and Big Picture Learning represents an important development in TMN’s story because it grows from a shared understanding: people learn differently, and education should create space for those differences.
“Young people do not always know what they are capable of before they are given the opportunity to try.”
Creating those opportunities means going beyond training alone. It means trusting young people with meaningful responsibilities, allowing them to participate in professional environments, and giving them the support to navigate uncertainty rather than waiting until they are considered “ready” or “adult enough” to create.
For Hasi and Emil, BIG BANG was an opportunity to enter an unfamiliar environment with no previous journalism experience and leave having produced interviews, photographs, videos, and published media alongside an experienced mentor.
For TMN and Big Picture Learning, the partnership demonstrates what can happen when learning moves beyond preparation and young people are given the space, trust, and responsibility to discover what they can actually do.
In this video, Hasi reflects on her experience as a TMN fellow covering BIG BANG 2026 in Dallas.
