Arts Corps is a nationally recognized leader in youth arts education that strives to ignite creativity, inspiring young people to believe in their capacity to learn, take risks, persist and achieve.
By integrating arts into K-12 classrooms, out-of-school arts and teen leadership program in communities where access to such programs is limited, Arts Corps’ vision is “a world where barriers to arts education no longer exist and all young people can creatively lead the transformation of schools, neighborhoods, and beyond.”
Reaching more than 2,500 students in South Seattle and South King County each year, Arts Corps programs foster creative and critical thinking skills, a sense of belonging, connection, and perseverance.
Make Art Anyway
Arts Corps’ teaching artists collaborate with classroom teachers to create lesson plans that integrate the arts and social justice into the students’ core curriculum.
The organization’s best work and greatest insights are realized through the collective wisdom of diverse points of view coming together around shared goals.
“In every aspect of our work, we are deeply committed to the cause of fairness, respect, and equality for individuals and communities. We recognize historic and systemic injustices and actively seek to dismantle them through our programs, in our organizational practices, and in our advocacy.”
Arts Corps
https://artscorps.org
Arts Corps’ youth-empowering programs:
- Creative Schools Initiative (CSI), an intensive arts integration program aimed at addressing the racial and economic disparity in access to arts education
- Out-of-school arts programs in dance, music, poetry and spoken word, theatre, visual art, and media guiding students through a deep exploration of art forms while examining art through a racial and social justice lens
- Arts Liberation Leadership Institute, a two-week intensive summer program where 28 youth are trained in artistry, social justice and organizing
- The Residency, a collaboration of Arts Corps, MoPOP, and Macklemore and Ryan Lewis that engages emerging youth hip hop-artists
- Massive Break Challenge, Seattle’s largest regional break dance battle for middle and high school youth
- Youth Speaks Seattle, a collective of young poets who develop leadership through spoken word poetry.
Arts Corps is a 2018-21 recipient of Best Starts for Kids Quality Out-of-School Time funding as a people of color-led organization, working with youth in two South King County elementary schools. Arts Corps also receives Best Starts for Kids funding through a place-based partnership with Southwest Youth and Family services and Geeking Out Kids of Color, serving young people in three housing communities in White Center, Burien, and SeaTac. Learn more about Best Starts for Kids and School’s Out Washington.
