creativeadvantageseattle.org | September 2018
In a Creative Advantage School...


Chief Sealth Students Elevate Their Voices Through Documentary Film Festival
La st spring, tenth-grade students at Chief Sealth International High School held their first grade-wide student film festival. Student filmmakers worked with Chief Sealth staff, mentor teaching artists from Arts Corps, Writers in the Schools and the Seattle International Film Festival, to write, film, produce and direct short documentary films. Topics were wide-ranging, covering such themes as food justice, school lock-downs and housing insecurity. There were additional opportunities to engage with the filmmakers in Q and A panels during the festival. Students discussed the creative process, their excitement about covering issues they were passionate about and how they overcame challenges in the production process. After the success of their first festival, the tenth-grade filmmakers are looking forward to an additional festival next school year. Check out the films by clicking on the photo to the left.
Arts Team Next Steps: Update your Arts Team
Last year's arts teams did an amazing work to grow the arts at their schools. In addition to Chief Sealth's exciting documentary film project, Southwest schools held family arts and culture nights. Teachers integrated theatre arts into their classrooms, and there were 14 partnerships across the ten schools with teaching artists and arts organizations from The Creative Advantage Arts Roster, including: Arts Corps, Jack Straw Productions, Sumayya Diop (dance), Andrew Peterson (visual arts), Roger Fernandes (Native American story-telling), Lauren Appel (visual arts), Seattle Children's' Theatre, Seattle Symphony and Bushwick Northwest.

This year, you can continue your good work with more arts events and arts integration. In addition, all of the schools have some funds left to spend on partnerships. Audrey Querns will email arts teams this week to inform them of the remaining funds. In the meantime, think about adding new people (staff, family and other community members). Maybe you need to replace a staff member or parent who has left the school, or maybe you have a new staff member who is excited to get involved in the growing the arts at your school. Please email Audrey with any updates to your team.
Teacher Arts Opportunities
Arts Infused Summer Conference - Launching into Engagement: Project-based Learning and the Arts
Oct 12-13, 2018, 8:30am - 4:30pm
This is a repeat of the summer conference which sold out.
PSESD Conference Center, Renton

Seattle International Film Festival

Classroom opportunity
Schools who may have interest in participating or questions may contact education@siff.net and connect with Dustin Kaspar, SIFF's Educational Programs Manager.
Seattle International Film Festival ( SIFF) has received a grant to collaborate with 3rd-5th grade teachers to expand science education within the Media Arts Standards (using creative animation, live-action, and documentary media making). Funding includes support for regular engagement with a media teaching artist in all classes participating, cooperating teacher stipends, curriculum building/documentation, and professional development workshop in Summer 2019 for other interested teachers. 1st semester will be collaborative design and most implemented curriculum will be in 2nd semester.
Resources
As you implement your school arts plans, here are a few websites and people you can look to for help:


The Creative Advantage Website & Toolkit houses the school arts plans, tools for planning partnerships, guidelines for contracts and invoices and more.

  The Community Arts Partner Roster is a vetted list of teaching artists and community arts and culture organizations approved to work in Seattle Public Schools through the Creative Advantage.

Here you can find resources for The Creative Advantage arts teams as well as resources related to the Naramore student art show, summer music, and for teachers, arts curriculum maps and cornerstone assessments.

If you can't find what you need on-line, contact the Creative Advantage staff:
 
Audrey Querns -SPS project manager for Creative Advantage (for questions about arts teams and planning, arts partner logistics like contracts and funding)
 
Lara Davis -Seattle Office of Arts and Culture Arts Education Manager and Tina LaPadula - Creative Youth Project Manager (for questions about the Arts Partner Roster and working with teaching artists and arts organizations) 

Gail Sehlhorst -SPS Visual and Performing Arts Manager (for questions about arts staffing, curriculum and assessment)
 
Kate Baker - SPS Media Arts Skills Center Project Manager