General information

Doctoral Student Program Receives State Grant

The California Arts Council, a state agency, announced that it plans to award $2,500 to a collaborative effort between the City of Davis, DJUSD, and the UC Davis Department of Theatre and Dance as part of its Professional Development grants program.

The Professional Development program builds arts organizations’ capacity for success through small grants to support professional development activities. In this case, the awarded project will

Help the City of Davis Arts & Cultural Affairs to collaborate with the UC Davis Department of Theatre and Dance, and Teaching Artist Sarah Hart, to offer a series of professional development workshops for Davis School District K-12 teachers interested in incorporating educational theatre into their classrooms.

The grant will support two weekend-long workshops each quarter of the academic year, which will take place at the UC Davis Department of Theatre and Dance. Dates and times will be confirmed over the summer, and interested teachers should reach out to Sarah Hart, a doctoral student, at sahart@ucdavis.edu for more information.

These workshops will address theatre in education theory and practice, as an opportunity to explore contemporary techniques and approaches for facilitating participatory theatre activities applicable to a range of sociocultural and classroom contents (like History, PE, Health, English and other languages). Through a mixture of presentations, discussions, and practical activities, participating teachers will gain an understanding of context-specific methodologies, in order to design and facilitate their own theatre in education lesson plans, document their experience and receive feedback through peer evaluations of each other’s work, as well as the teaching artist’s.

“With this approach, the ‘teacher’ becomes the ‘facilitator’,” said Hart, who will run the programs. “Their role is to encourage the students to freely communicate and express themselves as ‘participants’. The ‘facilitator’ does not play an authoritative role, but joins in the playful learning process and supports the ‘participants’ within dynamic, creative activities.”

“Utilizing the Arts to support the educational experience of all Davis students is a real priority for the City and arts community. We are looking forward to using this pilot project to consider how we might better support teachers in the classroom to feel confident in providing rich creative opportunities for their students.”  Rachel Hartsough, City of Davis, Arts & Culture Manager

“The exploration of new programming in Arts and Education reveals endless possibilities. The Department of Theatre and Dance at UC Davis welcomes this exciting partnership with the City of Davis and community educators.”  David Grenke, Professor and Chair Department of Theatre and Dance, UC Davis.

Funding for City of Davis programming, a $2,500 award, is part of a large influx of support for the arts announced last month by the state, in which grants totaling $16,376,475 have been awarded to nonprofit organizations and units of government across California. The City of Davis grant was featured as part of a larger announcement from the California Arts Council, which can be viewed online at http://arts.ca.gov/news/prdetail.php?id=265

The City of Davis Arts & Cultural Affairs Program supports community-based arts projects, cultural opportunities, and education initiatives that foster excellence, diversity, and vitality in the arts. The program is the clearinghouse for all creative activity in the City of Davis government, and serves the entire Davis community. We develop community partnerships, explore best practices, manage the public art collection, and support Civic Arts Commission initiative.

The mission of the California Arts Council, a state agency, is to advance California through the arts and creativity. The Council is committed to building public will and resources for the arts; fostering accessible arts initiatives that reflect contributions from all of California’s diverse populations; serving as a thought leader and champion for the arts; and providing effective and relevant programs and services. Members of the California Arts Council include: Chair Nashormeh Lindo, Vice Chair Larry Baza, Phoebe Beasley, Christopher Coppola, Juan Devis, Kathleen Gallegos, Jaime Galli, Donn K. Harris, Louise McGuinness, Steven Oliver, and Rosalind Wyman. Learn more at www.arts.ca.gov.

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