Youth Performing Arts Program

 

Zaccho Dance Theatre’s Youth Performing Arts Program (YPAP) is an arts education program developed to enhance classroom learning. The program is designed to help educate the mind and the physical body. YPAP was created to reflect and integrate the highly innovative performance work of the organization’s professional dance company with the life experiences and possibilities of our young neighbors in San Francisco’s Bayview Hunters Point. In our studio for over 20 years, Zaccho’s arts education program has served 100-150 predominantly low-income, African American and diverse children of color annually by offering free during-the-school-day and extracurricular classes to students 7-18 years old; engaging over 2,000 youth to-date. The youth explore their collective and individual potential in a professional setting through performance training, improvisation, personal research, and contemporary and aerial dance.  Each year, Artistic Director Haigood defines a curriculum topic and creates a study guide with input from educators and Zaccho teaching artists. The topics are drawn from issues that are historical, environmental and relevant to our community. A year-end performance event at a professional theater customarily features the hard work of participating youth.

2011-12 Teaching Artists: Byb Chanel, Joanna Haigood, Jo Kreiter, Sandia Langlois, Shakiri, Raissa Simpson, Matthew Wickett

Watch "Picture Bayview," stories by youth about San Francisco's Bayview Hunters Point told through dance and video. This project was a collaboration between Zaccho Dance Theatre and Baycat.