Jeff Arak is a freelance filmmaker living in New York City, producing videos that tell stories and increase critical understanding about our world. In recent years, Jeff has collaborated on promotional videos for the Arts and social sectors, cultural profiles of institutions, events, and individuals, as well as an educational series about blindness and, most recently, music videos. Jeff produces,
edits and shoots with a wide range of individuals and organizations while pursuing funding and grant research for ongoing investigations into Sign Language education in Mexico and immigration to the USA from Latin America. Before relocating to New York, Jeff spent three years in the field of public education, working first as a Latino Achievement Coordinator at a high school, and then at One World Youth Project, a non-profit in Washington DC, where he helped to bring cultural competence and international awareness to students around the world. In 2008, through a KWD Project for Peace Grant, Jeff received funds to equip a media lab on the Isthmus of Tehuantepec in Southern Mexico with video and audio equipment and train a small indigenous youth group to make short films. The youth group and their work is featured at the end of his award-winning undergraduate thesis film, which received the Betty and Harry S. Jeff's work continues to be informed by a strong background in community media and non-fiction story-telling.
