Congratulations to Kayla Moreno, who presented the most charming case for being our Valentine during a contest we held on our Conservatory Facebook page; Kayla will be attending the dress rehearsal of her choice this summer at the Bruns. Here’s the love letter she wrote us on Facebook:

Why should I be your Cal Shakes Valentine? Oooh … where do I begin? Three years ago I joined the Conservatory just for the sake of something to do over the summer. The end result was something to do over the summer for the next (at least) four years. My favorite summer is hard to pick, because they’re all so awesome!! I anticipate each newsletter, expecting it to be registration time. Why? Because it means that I am just THAT CLOSE to being back with all my Cal Shakes besties!

I can honestly say that most of my best friends are from the Conservatory. What I love most about them is that I can tell them (well, my closest ones!) anything from my biggest fears to my deepest fantasies. They’re the people that I know won’t laugh when I tell them that I wanted a pet unicorn when I was a kid and actually thought that my unicorn stuffed animals would come to life. OK, so, maybe they’ll laugh. But in a friendish way! They’re the people that I can anticipate auditioning for American Idol with next year when I’m of age ;) lol you know who you are.

When the second semester rolls around, I always start up a Countdown to the Conservatory and hang it up on my wall. I’m a little slow on that, but I’ll get to it tomorrow, I promise! :)

Cal Shakes has been a part of my life since I was just starting middle school and it’s helped me through all the twists and turns of just starting to become a teenager, in a strange way. I know that I won’t be scared for high school next year because I’ll have had such a great summer that thoughts of fear won’t even have time to cross my mind. My self esteem is never higher than those five weeks of summer. The Conservatory is a place for someone like me to be able to just be herself without the worry of someone judging her for being a theater geek. Because, hey, it’s a camp MADE of and for theater geeks! :)

SO EXCITED FOR SUMMER!!

Happy Valentine’s Day :)

Summer Shakespeare Conservatories are enrolling now in Lafayette, Oakland hills, and San Francisco.

Pictured: Sandy Serwin, Kayla Moreno, and Margaret Williams in the 2010 conservatory production of The Comedy of Errors; photo by Jay Yamada.

California Shakespeare Theater announced today that it has received a $20,000 grant from Bank of America Charitable Foundation to support the Theater’s Artistic Learning efforts in bringing arts education into underserved schools through a comprehensive program of classroom residencies and student matinee performances at the Bruns Amphitheater.

“We are extremely grateful to Bank of America Foundation for providing this much-needed support for our Artistic Learning program,” commented Managing Director Susie Falk. “Arts education has been almost entirely eliminated from state budgets, but thanks to institutions like Bank of America, Cal Shakes is able to go into schools throughout the Bay Area and begin to fill some of the gaps in arts-based learning.”

Cal Shakes’ in-school residencies partner classroom teachers with teaching artists to more deeply engage students in core curriculum subjects such as English and History, using arts-based approaches that support state-mandated curriculum and teacher professional development. The Student Discovery Matinee Series offers an opportunity for students to experience one of Cal Shakes’ Main Stage productions in a contextualized experience designed for young audiences. The program includes an informative Teacher’s Guide, a lively pre-performance interactive engagement at the Theater, and a post-show question-and answer-session with the actors. In 2010, Cal Shakes served 1,038 low-income students in 40 classrooms throughout the Bay Area through its in-school residencies, while 1,702 low-income students attended student matinees of the world-premiere production of John Steinbeck’s The Pastures of Heaven or the critically-acclaimed Much Ado About Nothing.

Bank of America and its associates invest resources and volunteer time to the communities in which they live and work. Each year, the Bank of America Charitable Foundation invests $200 million in communities across its global footprint to help set opportunity in motion for diverse individuals and families. By partnering with local community leaders, Bank of America identifies priorities in each market it serves and determines how its charitable investments can have the greatest and most positive impact in those neighborhoods.

Click here to read more about Cal Shakes’ Artistic Learning programs.

You’re probably familiar with the dire statistics on California’s funding for arts education: The 2009 state budget cut funding for K–12 students by $2.5 million, or $400 per student; a 2007 study by SRI International showed that 96% of California middle schools and 72% of high schools fail to offer standards-aligned courses of study in all four arts disciplines*, thus failing to meet state education goals.

What you may not be familiar with is the many ways that Cal Shakes addresses the gaps left by the government, including Summer Shakespeare Conservatories, Student Discovery Matinees, after-school programs, and classroom residencies. This time of year, our teaching artists are busy partnering with classroom teachers all over the Bay Area to bring the arts and the classics to a wide variety of fall residencies.

At EC Reems Academy in East Oakland, Teaching Artists Emily Morrison and Marissa Wolf are working with four classroom teachers to study Much Ado About Nothing. Last year’s residency took place in two eighth-grade classrooms; this fall sees an expansion to two seventh-grade classes, bringing the total number of EC Reems residency students to 74. Each grade is studying a different group of scenes— including the big dance scene, for which the older kids are choosing the music. “Marissa and I collaborated from the start,” says Emily, also Cal Shakes’ Artistic Learning Programs Manager, “selecting a variety of scenes for each grade level to work on.  Now that we are putting the groups back together for the culminating showcase, the kids get a greater sense of the play as a whole.”

Also studying Much Ado are the four fifth-grade classes at Fruitvale Elementary, where Teaching Artist Laura Lowry worked so well with fourth-grade teacher Maureen Whelan last year that Whelan advocated successfully to include her younger class again this time around; and all five seventh-grade classes at Charlotte Wood Middle School in Danville, where Cal Shakes Associate Artist Clive Worsley is continuing his five-year partnership with teachers Linda Roshay and Kathleen McCabe.

Another longstanding residency relationship is that of Teaching Artist Norman Gee and Oakland High School teacher Mike Jones, who are partnering for the fifth time this year. Jones’ two ninth-grade classes are studying Romeo and Juliet this fall. In addition, Cal Shakes is expanding its activities to include the Environmental Science Academy (ESA), a smaller learning community within Oakland High, whose high-achieving students follow a common academic program emphasizing academics and careers in environmental science. A Cal Shakes teaching artist, working with ESA’s cofounder Katherine Noonan, will guide the school’s tenth-grade English and History students through curriculum based on Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, focusing on literary merits, California history, and love of the land.

At Oakland Technical High School—our newest residency partner, born out of Jessa Brie Berkner’s Advanced Drama students’ international success with Hamlet: Blood in the Brain—a Cal Shakes teaching artist will partner with Berkner’s ninth-grade English/Drama class to investigate Walter Dean Myers’ young adult novel Fallen Angels. The students will use dramatization as one way to explore the book’s themes of war, human rights, and race relations.
Five schools.

16 classrooms in all. Just one way in which Cal Shakes invests in the next generation of Californians by providing in-depth, far-reaching creative educational opportunities.
* Visual arts, music, dance, and theater.

You may have read her name before, in a past newsletter or on our blog. You may have seen her picture on Cal Shakes conservatory brochures, postcards, or posters. If you’ve been to our theater, you’ve most likely been greeted by her mother, longtime House Manager Claire Stoermer. And if you were at the Bruns on the opening day of  the 2010 season, you may have seen 14-year-old Zendaya Coleman helping to sweep the new plaza!

Now the rest of the world is about to be introduced to this talented former Cal Shakes conservatory student. On Sunday, November 7, she made her television debut in Shake It Up!, the Disney Channel’s latest foray into the buddy-comedy genre. Shake it Up!—created by Chris Thompson of Laverne & Shirley and Bosom Buddies fame—stars Zendaya and Bella Thorne (Big Love, My Own Worst Enemy, Dirty Sexy Money) as two best friends who become background dancers on a Chicago TV show.

Congratulations to Zendaya and her parents; we’re incredibly proud to have them in our Cal Shakes family.

More info:

The Disney Channel’s Shake It Up! website.

An interview with Zendaya in Diablo magazine.

Zendaya gives a shout-out to Cal Shakes in Variety.

Pictured: Zendaya Coleman; photo courtesy of JE Talent.