Colorado Shakespeare Festival Receives $25,000 NEA grant
The Shakespeare in American Communities grant funds CSF’s Shakespeare & Violence prevention school tour.
Arts Midwest today announced $1 million in grants to 40 non-profit, professional theater companies across 26 states, including the Colorado Shakespeare Festival, to perform the works of William Shakespeare for students. The Shakespeare in American Communities grant will support CSF’s touring Shakespeare & Violence Prevention project, which combines live performance of Shakespeare plays with an anti-violence curriculum.
CSF’s Shakespeare & Violence Prevention project has introduced more than 83,000 Colorado students to Shakespeare since 2011. During the 2017-18 school year, middle and high schools throughout the state will host performances of Julius Caesar, followed by post-show classroom workshops using theatre techniques (supported by behavioral science research) to help students practice intervention strategies for preventing violence and bullying in their schools.
“This school tour is a crucial component of the Colorado Shakespeare Festival as a whole, and it is the first exposure to Shakespeare for many communities across our state,” said Timothy Orr, CSF Producing Artistic Director. “Shakespeare is for everyone, and our school touring program was developed to inspire young audiences throughout the state, not just audiences with easy access to our home stage in Boulder. We are thrilled to have a project we believe in so deeply recognized by the National Endowment for the Arts and Arts Midwest, and to continue sharing Shakespeare with Colorado schools.”
This marks the fifteenth consecutive year of Shakespeare in American Communities, a national program managed by Arts Midwest in partnership with the National Endowment for the Arts.
“The National Endowment for the Arts is proud to support opportunities for youth in communities across the country to see a live Shakespeare production, as well as the educational activities that help them to get the most out of the experience,” said NEA Chairman Jane Chu. “Partnerships like this one with Arts Midwest help the NEA to achieve its mission of giving people across America access to the arts.”
ABOUT THE PROJECT: Colorado Shakespeare Festival (CSF)’s Shakespeare & Violence Prevention program combines Shakespeare in live performance with research on bullying and school violence. Professional actors from CSF perform a live, stripped-down Shakespeare play onsite at a Colorado school, then lead classroom workshops with students using theatre techniques (supported by behavioral science research) to help students practice intervention strategies for preventing violence and bullying in their schools. CSF will tour Julius Caesar to middle and high schools, and The Comedy of Errors to elementary schools throughout the 2017-18 school year. Both productions will be directed by CSF Managing Director Wendy Franz. This program is a partnership between CSF and the Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence on campus at CU Boulder, and is additionally supported by the CU Office for Outreach & Engagement, White Wave Foods, and the Boulder Arts Commission.
The National Endowment for the Arts in partnership with Arts Midwest presents Shakespeare in American Communities. The Colorado Shakespeare Festival is one of 40 professional theater companies selected to participate in bringing the finest productions of Shakespeare to middle- and high-school students in communities across the United States.