Arts Education: Connecting with the Community
Playhouse Square Center’s Arts Education Department hosts nearly 300 events annually that draw more than 100,000 people. Among these events are family workshops, teen programs, professional development opportunities for educators, classes for adults, plus residencies and workshops designed to connect Northeast Ohio residents with the professional touring artists who perform on Playhouse Square Center’s stages.
The Center’s strategic plan sets forth four education initiatives designed to inspire connections between artists and audiences, students and teachers, children and adults, cultures and communities:
Our Community Onstage - events and opportunities to celebrate hometown artistic achievement, spotlight local professional artists/companies, and develop talent in our neighborhoods and communities.
Educators’ Resources – programs that assist over 1000 educators annually to integrate performing arts into classroom work by providing professional development classes, workshops, events and educational materials.
Presenting for Kids & Families – the best national/international touring productions for school matinees and public performances, which draw more than 50,000 school children and 20,000 families annually.
Arts Education Center – Idea Center at Playhouse Square opened in September 2005 as a premier arts education facility to link best practices in arts education with the country’s most exciting artists.
Free pre-and-post show discussions for Broadway Series shows
Arts Education Classes – classes and workshops designed to expand the arts experience of teens, adults, families and anyone with an interest in a creative way to approach learning.
The last initiative is a long-held dream that has finally come to fruition. As part of a joint partnership with WVIZ/PBS and 90.3 WCPN ideastream, the Idea Center at Playhouse Square opened in September 2005 and occupies 92,000 square feet of the One Playhouse Square Building. A private partnership bequeathed the building to Playhouse Square Foundation in 1999. ideastream and Playhouse Square Foundation then embarked on a joint capital campaign to raise funds to renovate the building into a state-of-the-art broadcast and education facility.
The Idea Center is now home to the Foundation’s arts education programs and features a fully-appointed dance studio, classrooms, workshop areas and performance space, all aimed at nurturing community members’, students’ and educators’ talents and interest in the arts. This adaptive reuse of One Playhouse Square includes radio, television, Internet, interactive broadband and distance learning systems, as well as facilities for training educators in the use of technology, while also providing space for meetings by many local organizations.
The new space and resources of the Idea Center have made it possible for the Arts Education Department to introduce new after-school programming for teens, family workshops to complement shows in the Discovery Theatre Series plus classes for adults in topics such as cabaret singing, public speaking and musical theater history.
The Department will continue to offer its popular Broadway Buzz programs (pre-show talks, post-show chats and master classes related to performances in the McDonald Financial Group Broadway Series at Playhouse Square Center), as well as its teen volunteer program (Students Take A Role at the Square – STARS), artist residencies and quality youth theater performances for students and families.
Now in its third year, the Partners in Performance (PIP) program is recognized as a best-practices model by the Kennedy Center, Ohio Arts Council and other organizations. Through PIP, educators receive training and materials to assist them as they incorporate arts education into their classrooms. American Express is a proud supporter of the PIP program.
