Progressive Arts Alliance is one of only 14 members of the National Guild of Community Schools of the Arts and the only organization in Ohio to receive a grant through the MetLife Foundation Partners in Arts Education Program.  The program’s goal is to improve teaching and learning in the arts by supporting and promoting exemplary partnerships between community arts education providers and public schools.  MetLife’s funding will support the PAA-George Washington Carver School Arts-Integrated Residency Partnership that has been in place since the 2006-07 school year, allowing all 462 K-8 students at the school the opportunity to engage in meaningful arts learning activities.

The PAA-Carver Arts-Integrated Residency Partnership pairs professional teaching artists with K-8 classroom teachers at Carver.  Artists and teachers collaboratively create dynamic arts lessons that integrate the arts with non-arts curricula content and meet Ohio Academic Content Standards in Fine Arts and other subjects.  In addition, the funding provides for teachers and artists to participate in arts-integration professional development workshops, and for residency activities to be designed to increase parent and community involvement at the school.  Students engage in a variety of residency activities, including music, printmaking, poetry, and media arts workshops.  Each semester will conclude with a community exhibition/performance to share the students’ achievements.

Please join us in thanking the MetLife Foundation and the National Guild of Community Schools of the Arts for supporting the PAA-Carver partnership, and for enabling more than 11,500 students in 8 cities to participate in quality arts education programs in school.

Teachers and PAA Staff planning at Carver.

Group to Demonstrate Positive Nature of Hip-Hop;                     Benefit Concert for Trip October 16 at Idea Center