Mehmet Rıfat Özkurt and Muhammed Onur Takım, 10th grade students at Bilkent Erzurum Laboratory School (BELS), have been awarded fourth place in the 14-18 age group at the Peace in the Streets Global Film Festival (PSGFF). Their short film, “The Hook,” focuses on a local tradition of helping the poor, promoting the message that “sharing brings happiness and peace.”
PSGFF is an international platform for filmmakers who are 18 and younger, which enables them to communicate what they would do to maintain peace at the local level. Organized by the Peacemaker Corps organization, the festival has reached over 150,000 teens since 1999. The overall mission of the Peacemaker Corps is “to facilitate and support peace and tolerance education among the youth of the world.”
Mehmet and Onur have been invited to the festival’s awards presentation luncheon, which will take place at the United Nations headquarters in New York. They will also be recognized at the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations Plural+ Video Festival at the Paley Media Center in New York. Their film can be accessed through this link: