BREAKOUT SESSIONS A
Thursday, April 4 – 10:15am CT
Session A1: Natural Resources
Jordan Knecht (he/him), Teaching Artist, Chicago Arts Partnerships in Education (CAPE)
Charles Bessett (he/him), Community Partner, CAPE
Sophia Ulloa (she/her), Community Member, CAPE
This session will focus on how our CAPE community class uses natural resources found within and around the school, including non-conventional materials (rusty metal, collected stories, and discarded clothing), to facilitate collaborative projects. We will introduce our concept of natural resources, which includes not only physical materials, but the resources found within each member of our class as well. Participants will come away with an expanded concept of what kinds of materials can be used creatively in a classroom. They will learn new collaborative strategies that, rather than be limited by physical ability, celebrate the unique abilities of each participant. They will also learn innovative techniques for non-conventional dyeing, including ice-dye, bleach discharging, and rust-dye.
Thursday, April 4 – 10:15am – 11:15am CT
Location: Churchill, 3rd Floor
Track: Teaching Artists
Session A2: Dismantling the Master’s House: Tools for Equitable Organizational Change
Clockwork Janz (they/them), Director of Creative Talent + Equitable Partnerships, Arts for Learning Indiana
There is no quick and easy fix to old and inequitable structures doing harm within your community, but there are many free tools out there for making equitable changes to your organization. Keeping on these tools, and being steady and persistent, are necessary to drive systemic change. This session will focus on becoming familiar with some of the free tools out there, setting goals for putting these tools into action, and building a network of accountability for moving this work forward. Also, one participant will come away with a copy of All About Love: New Vision by bell hooks, an important text for integrating oneself into a new space in their equity journey.
Thursday, April 4 – 10:15am – 11:15am CT
Location: Dickinson II, 4th Floor
Tracks: Executive Leadership, Program Staff
Session A3: The Healing Arts: Lessons from a Trauma Informed Healing Arts Theater Program
Sam Leopold (he/him), Program Manager, Partnership with Children
Katie Nicholson, Clinical Director, Partnership with Children
Join us for a dynamic and participatory session focused on the impact that community, healing, and theater collaboration have on academic and social emotional learning (SEL) in four elementary schools in Brownsville, Brooklyn. Participants will learn about the collaborative program model we employ in our four-year, federally funded Student Voice and Engagement program. This session will center on lessons we have learned as we work to implement a program that hinges on collaboration across the school ecosystem to support students’ social emotional learning and English Language Arts skill development through the exploration of theater, using best practices in theater education, social work, and evaluation. Participants will walk away with best practices and tools for program design, partnership, and assessment of arts and SEL learning.
Thursday, April 4 – 10:15am – 11:15am CT
Location: Dickinson III, 4th Floor
Track: Program Staff
Session A4: From Partnership to Programming: Engaging Community to Impact Program Design (Panel Discussion)
Facilitator:
Amy Rasmussen (she/her), Executive Director, Chicago Arts Partnerships in Education (CAPE)
Panelists:
Ellamonique Baccus (she/her), Executive Director, Arts Partners
Claudia Gomez (she/her), Senior Manager of Programs, Center for Arts-Inspired Learning
Tya Anthony (she/they), Director of Education, RedLine Contemporary Art Center
Learn best practices and innovative strategies from three organizations that collaborate with their communities to design and implement programs. Arts Partners’s Artists to Authors program was a competitive paid fellowship for local BIPOC artists and authors that resulted in the publication of culturally relevant books used by Arts Partners in arts integration programs in Wichita public schools. Spanish Sprouts is the Center for Arts-Inspired Learning’s preschool multi-arts initiative that works closely with educators, parents, and community stakeholders to deepen cultural connections to the communities served by CAL beyond the school day. RedLine Contemporary Art Center operates using a Methodology of Community Responsiveness that transforms ideas born from the community into implemented programs with the voice, experience, and leadership of constituents and participants inherently built into the process, creating pathways for community members to be integrated into all facets of RedLine’s programming.
Thursday, April 4 – 10:15am – 11:15am CT
Location: Wilde Ballroom, 3rd Floor
Track: Program Staff
Session A5: Focusing Your Organization’s Time and Effort on What is Most Essential
Facilitator: Bill Pearson (he/him), Board Chair, Young Audiences National / Board Member, Young Audiences New York
This interactive session will address current questions on the minds of many nonprofit leaders: How do you determine which functions within your organization can be outsourced? What are successful examples of outsourcing non-mission specific functions, such as human resources, finance, and technology? What are the best practices and common pitfalls to avoid when making this transition? In this conversation, participants will share their own successes and challenges and take away practical strategies for moving forward.
Thursday, April 4 – 10:15am – 11:15am CT
Location: Dickinson I, 4th Floor
Track: Executive Leadership