Governor’s Service Awards, 2009

Here we are being honored as one of three finalists for the Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter partnership award that honors outstanding service learning collaborations between an institute of higher education and a community service organization.  A great time was had by all!!

Telling It COPE Celebration

You Are Invited to A Celebration of the Creative Endeavors of the Students of

Telling It C.O.P.E.

Thursday, May 21st 1-2pm

COPE School
1055 Cornell
Ypsilanti 48197

Telephone; 734-547-0419

COPE helps students having difficulty in traditional schools to experience success in academics and conflict management enabling them to achieve positive goals in the home, school, and community.

Facebooking

The students of our core course, Empowering Our Communities Through Creative Expression, have created a facebook page!  In it find pictures, videos, and posts by participants.  Pretty neat.

Final Telling It Celebrations!

Telling It Teens and Remix will be struttin their stuffs on Tuesday April 21st at the Riverside Arts Center in Ypsilanti from 5-6:30 PM!  It’s free and there’s food!

Please come and see what we’re up to .  .  .come and support our artists . . . come and say hi!

Artist of the month: Nicole!!

Nicole is a participant in the Telling It Teens program. She has been a Telling It Teen for over a year and is now the leader of the group; gathering the group together each week, keeping them in line during the workshop and making sure that things go smoothly from the Ozone House end. Nicole is an amazing writer who has written, recorded and performed some of her work in the Telling It and Ozone House community. What I love the most about Nicole is that she is willing to take risks as an artist. I have seen her inspire other young people to write, share and explore who they are through the power of the pen.

Intergenerational Theatre Performance

Seniors and students from the RCCTC’s Intergenerational Theatre Program have been invited to perform their interactive piece, “Senior Moments” in Ann Arbor’s Turner Senior Resource Center!  The event will celebrate Turner’s volunteers.

This Friday afternoon, we’ll be struttin’ our stuff for a new audience, and hopefully starting some interesting dialogue on age discrimination.

New photos and music!

Our new photos and music samples are in from Telling It fall 2008!  Click here to see what we’ve been up to.  Or click on the orange box to the right to hear us.

Telling It Celebrations!!

“Telling It Kids and Telling It Teens will be sharing their work on Tuesday, December 16th from 5-7pm at the Riverside Arts Center 76 North Huron Street, Ypsilanti 48197.  Children and youth ages 6-22 from SOS Community Services and the Ozone House Drop In Center will be showcasing their art and creative writing on the walls and at the microphone.  This is an inspiring evening that gives voice and recognition to the talent and artistry of the Telling It youngsters and also supports the U-M students who have been working with them.

For more information contact Deb Gordon-Gurfinkel at dmgordon@umich.edu.

“Telling It COPE will be presenting their work on Thursday, December 18th from 1-2pm at COPE, an alternative middle and high school located at 1055 Cornell, Ypsilanti 48197.  The students will be sharing their creative writing and showcasing an unusual approach to giving a fictional character a rich life…come and discover just what that means and enjoy a wonderful catered meal courtesy of the Culinary Institute. U-M students have been working with local artists to highlight the creative voices of the COPE students.  Visit the mural designed and painted by the students with graffiti artist Scotty G.

For more information contact Deb Gordon-Gurfinkel at dmgordon@umich.edu or call COPE School at 734-547-0419″

Hannan House Performance

The Intergenerational Theater group, consisting of Senior Citizens from Detroit’s Hannan House, as well as students from RCHUMS 334 Sec 002 (Empowering Our Communities Through Creative Expression), has been working all semester on developing performance material aimed at exploring age discrimination.  We would like to present what we have developed for a live audience—and you are invited!

Using the forum theater method founded by Brazilian activist Augusto Boal, this piece we’ve titled “Senior Moments” will present two interactive skits derived from dialogue and personal experience.

Please come!  It’ll be a very “lo-fi,” informal presentation.  Participation is absolutely voluntary!  You’ll laugh . . .you’ll cry . . . it’ll be better than Cats. . .

1:15-2:00 PM
Room 124
East Quad
701 E. University

Wait–who else is running?

A few weeks ago the Americans for the Arts Action Fund released a Congressional Arts Report Card for 2007 to inform voters of how their elected officials have performed in promoting or demoting public funding for the arts.  The full report can be found here.  Highlights include:

• Support for the arts is growing
• Support for the arts is bi-partisan
• Members of the senate cultural caucus include Ted Kennedy, Joe Lieberman, Debbie Stabenow, and Hillary Clinton (No Obama nor McCain and no Carl Levin)
• Southeast Michigan reps’ grades in voting to support the arts who are up for re-election:
  • Sander Levin (District 12): A
  • Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick (District 13): B+
  • Joe Knollenberg (District 9): B
  • John Conyers (District 14): A
  • John Dingell (District 15): A
  • Thad McCotter (District 11): A
  • Timothy Walberg (District 7): D

• NEA appropriations is at $144.7 million; it has grown steadily since 2001when it was $104.8 million, but made a huge leap in 2007

Curious to see what happens next year as we wade our way through the financial detritus.  Still! Vote to support the arts!  We need it now more than ever!