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// Awards & Accomplishments

In a continuing effort to create with the community, Living Arts has formed strategic partnerships with other organizations. These partnerships, allow us to offer infinite opportunities for residents to discover their creative spark. This collaborative effort contributes to the vitality of the area.

AWARDS:

• 2007 Spirit of Detroit Award for organizational excellence, improving the quality of life, and community leadership
• Recipient of the 2005 Leonard Smith Award for Organizational Excellence from Youth Development Commission
• In 2002 & 2004 El Arte was selected by ArtServe Michigan for a "Best Practices" award.

ACCOMPLISHMENTS:

• Southwest Dance is celebrating 10 years of providing excellence in dance instruction.
• One of the lead organizations in a collaborative effort to create and open the Center of Music and Performing Arts Southwest (COMPAS) in Fall 2007, which hosts a variety of classes in ballet, hip hop, flamenco, Brazilian capeoira, African dance and drum, Mexican folkloric, violin, guitar, keyboard, salsa and tango.
• Youth Dance Ensemble has performed at Wayne State University, “That’s Tap” student production, Marygrove College, and Music Hall.
• Started with 19 students in 1999 and now serves 1,200 participants annually.
• We have engaged several thousand teachers, artists, parents, and students directly
  in curriculum-based creative projects.
• "Truck Art" project had students use math, social studies and visual arts to
  design murals for GM trucks displayed nationwide (El Arte project).
• A 2007-2008 study revealed that students who engaged in our arts-infused educational programming methods for three years scored, on average, twice as high academically as those students who did not  participate.

 

Quotes of Impact:

"Our teachers and students have benefited greatly from the infusion of local artists into the classroom and corresponding curriculum--a process that has produced real, long-term learning."

— Dr. Cecilia Kendrick, Principal, Academy of the Americas

 

"Our teachers have benefited by learning new strategies for teaching core curriculum and by working with our community's artists."

— Ellen Snedeker, Principal, Maybury Elementary