Conducted by the Diversity Awareness Partnership, Metro Theater Company and professional artists, the Diversity Arts Summer Program is under the direction of Emily Task, program director at the Diversity Awareness Partnership and the founder of the summer program.

“Witnessing the segregation and isolation that exists in some communities, and the hatred and ignorance that goes unchallenged through generations, can be so damaging,” says Task. “I developed this program to offer an empowering space in which young people can engage in a different reality, and explore tools to create pathways back into their schools and communities.”
Task notes that the program seeks to help students understand their own multiple identities, but also to support the building of allied relationships between other cultural, community and identity-based groups. “We offer them a safe space to explore, share, reflect — and to be successful.”

Teaching artists at this compelling summer program include Emily Kohring, education director and artistic associate at Metro Theater Company, Rodney Smith, and Brett Williams. Speakers who met with the students during the 2010 program include representatives from the Organization for Black Struggle, Interfaith Partnership, Missouri Immigrant & Refugees Advocates (MIRA), Planned Parenthood, and College Summit.

SPECIAL EVENT: At the end of the two week program, two special events featuring the students’ imaginative works take place.  These special events are held at the Regional Arts Commission, 6128 Delmar Blvd. in St. Louis. The public is invited.  A gallery show of the students’ projects runs for two weeks after the special event.

DATES: The program dates for 2011 are TBD.

For more information, call Nancy Tonkins at Metro Theater Company at 314-997-6777.

While our programs occur most often in schools, we are delighted to design and conduct programs with social service agencies and other  community organizations too.  For example, we were proud to be a part of these collaborations:

• In a unique three-way partnership in 2009 with the Pulitzer Foundation for the Arts and the Alzheimer’s Association, we facilitated personal connections between adults with early stage dementia and students from Cole Elementary School in  St. Louis.  Paintings by the Old Masters at the Pulitzer were the focus of a project that brought the groups together.  Care for each other is what made the program special.

• Twenty-one teenagers from 16 different high schools all over St. Louis gathered in  July 2009 for the Diversity Arts Program, presented in association with Diversity Awareness Partnership. The teen participants represented public and private schools, and a variety  of  cultural and socioeconomic backgrounds. Over the course of two weeks, this diverse group of teens came together as a community as they engaged in deep dialogue about social justice issues and then responded to that dialogue  through the creation of art.

• In conjunction with Children’s Home Society in the fall of 2009, we offered a 6-week drama workshop for adoptive and foster children ages 11 to 15.  Led by our experienced and caring teaching artists, young people in this unique and engaging drama experience explored non-competitive games, improvisation, and theater exercises that fostered collaboration, encouraged success, and built non-verbal communication skills.  Through improvisation techniques, students talked about issues of concern, and helped each other strategize solutions to challenges faced by the group.  (Studies indicate that theater activity is a powerful intervention strategy to encourage non-violent behavior in youth.)