Review of The Yesman

Check out Jana Tasich's review of The Yes Man, an original play that is the result of a collaboration between The Enrichment Center, students at UNCSA, and Art Tasting.

Local Theater Students Use Arts To Teach

Here is an article from the May 6, 2010 edition of the Winston-Salem Chronicle on Wake Forest University theater students using teachers' curricula to further students' understanding of their lessons. Excuse the format- I didn't have a scanner big enough to get the full page in one file.

Creative Aging Symposium: Thursday and Friday in Greensboro

The Creative Aging Symposium offers artists and healthcare professionals ways to embrace creativity and advance culture change in aging service environments. Because of the rapidly expanding older population and related lifestyle changes, we must find new ways to improve the quality of life for older adults of all ability levels. This highly interactive two-day Symposium will highlight important research results and raise awareness of resources available at the national, state and local levels during the General Session on Thursday. Workshops on Friday will offer experiential concurrent sessions providing valuable hands-on tools to encourage innovative thought and implementation of new creative programs.

Objectives: (1) learn about the untapped potential of older adults and the growing field of creative aging, including research and programming at the national, state and local levels (2) receive hands-on training in creative programs that you can take back to your community (3) learn about the resources and creative opportunities that exist for older adults locally, regionally and nationally, and (4) connect with other artists and aging service providers in your area.

What an impressive organization to have right here in the Piedmont. Attend if you can!

Teaching Literacy While Instilling Empathy in Students

Troubles, Worries, Work

Moving day. It always scared me to death.
Troubles, worries, work.
It includes everything to make me crazy. Some people
like it, but not me. There is always some
hope but what are hopes? Hopes bring
troubles, worries, work,
and they include everything to make me crazy. Some people
like it, but not me. I would like not to move.
I would like to stay, because actually days
are not moving. There are no moving days.
Time stays. We move. I would like to stay
not to move.

-- Madmax

Stumbled upon a great resource called Teaching Tolerance, a project of the Southern Poverty Law Center. One particular project drew me in-- teachers use poetry by homeless people to teach literacy. Students read and understand a poem, write a poem based on their feelings about home, learn to understand why some people are homeless, and empathize with other homeless children. This method of teaching has such multiplying benefits. While attempting to reach a singular of teaching literacy, teachers can affect students' emotional maturity, give a social studies lesson, and encourage students to express themselves in artistic ways.

The poem above is from a writing workshop at the Clergy Coalition Shelter for the Homeless in Hoboken, New Jersey.

Pixels for Food: Artist Bill Brown Uses Design Skills as Fundraising Tool

A friend of mine named Bill Brown, who is a graduate of Wake Forest, spoke yesterday at a conference in New Orleans called Launch Fest, self-labeled a "fun conference for serious entrepreneurs." The project Bill discussed is called Pixels for Food. Bill has been working at a community center and food pantry for the last year called the Community Center of St. Bernard. Pixels for Food is an online donation site inspired by his experience there. Check out a screen shot of the site below. The site is interactive, so be sure to visit yourself.

The Enrichment Center and UNCSA Collaborate on Play as Part of Kenan Institute for the Arts' ACCORD Initiative

As part of the Thomas S. Kenan Institute for the Arts’ ACCORD Initiative, The Enrichment Center and students from the University of North Carolina School of the Arts (UNCSA), who are also part of Art Tasting, an emerging performing arts organization in Winston-Salem, are presenting an original short play by Ian Antal and Suzy McCalley. The play, entitled “The Yesman,” will be performed Thursday, April 29 at 7:00 p.m. at The Enrichment Center at 1006 S. Marshall Street in Winston-Salem.
Visit the Kenan Institute's website for more information.

Gulu Choir Sings "Home"

Although The Voice Project is by no means local organization (it's based in Uganda), it offers a truly inspiring example of social change through art. Ravaged by conflict and war, Ugandan women, victims of rape and widowhood themselves, are using songs to bring home boy soldiers who have fled to the bush in shame and fear of the violence they committed. These songs are played on the radio or sung by women's choirs in villages across Uganda.

I found out about the organization because of an international exchange in which musicians offer up their talent and music in various ways to help bring attention to the work of the Voice Project. The Gulu Women's Choir sings a song I enjoy, "Home" by Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros. I applaud these musicians for bringing attention to the project with their voices, but the truly remarkable voices are those of the women who communicate love, acceptance, and forgiveness with their voices.

"Home" in Gulu from The Voice Project on Vimeo.