CENTER FOR ARTS-INSPIRED LEARNING’s ARTWORKS PROGRAM CELEBRATES ITS 10th ANNIVERSARY

Teen arts-based jobs training program has hired over 1,000 students for unique, inspiring experience

Free performance & CELEBRATION

Tuesday, AUG 4, 6pm at TRI-C METRO CAMPUS

Main Stage Theater, 2900 Community College Ave, CLE, OH 44115

Cleveland, OH (July 31, 2015)—Center for Arts-Inspired Learning’s student apprenticeship program uses the arts to prepare students for 21st-century success.

On their first day of work as ArtWorks apprentices, new students enter a room filled with strangers, artists, and goals—learn to work with other students from across Northeast Ohio to create new art. On the last day they leave inspired to pursue bold ambitions.

ArtWorks has employed 1,313 high school students from 69 Northeast Ohio schools in paid, arts-based apprenticeships that develop artistic expertise and cultivate core competences. By equipping students from diverse backgrounds with skills that are vital to educational and professional success—ingenuity, critical thinking, creative problem-solving, responsibility, project planning and management, communication, collaboration, and leadership—the program prepares for success in the 21st-century classroom and beyond.

Now in its 10th year, ArtWorks has grown in response to demand. Started by Marsha Dobrzynski and Deborah Ratner in 2005, the program began as a two-week pilot serving 50 teens under a tent in Shaker Square. It has expanded into a year-round program that engages a dozen partners in serving over 200 youth each year. Recent co-op offerings include dance, fashion design, recording arts, digital game design, photography, performance poetry, animation, and film.

Apprentices develop self-confidence through a variety of challenges, completing service-based projects, and hosting performances. Students participate in workshops with community partners focusing on financial literacy, resume writing, interviewing skills, and college admissions and financial aid processes. Presentations by guest speakers increase awareness of career opportunities and ways in which skills developed through arts education are valuable in a variety of professional settings. Apprentices leave the program with portfolios to use when applying for educational and employment opportunities—and ready to see a future of opportunity.

About the Center for Arts-Inspired Learning

The Center for Arts-Inspired Learning (formerly Young Audiences of Northeast Ohio) enriches the lives of children and promotes creative learning by uniting arts and education.  Organized in 1953, the Center for Arts-Inspired Learning is the only multi-arts resource for schools and communities in the region  whose primary purpose is to make learning through the arts an essential part of young people’s education. Programs take place in public, private, and parochial schools as well as libraries, hospitals and other civic spaces, reaching nearly 220,000 young people each year. For more information visit www.arts-inspiredlearning.org

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