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Jack Straw Education Programs



Student from Kimball Elementary in the Jack Straw studios, April 2009
Photo by Sherwin Eng.

Jack Straw productions has a commitment to art and technology education for all ages. We have implemented a wide range of classroom, in-studio, and learning programs for children and adults. Through our radio drama, music, and creative audio production programs, students work with professional artists to learn about the arts and to develop ways to express themselves creatively.

Find out more about our different school programs.

Jack Straw has developed partnerships with a variety of community organizations, artists, and schools to create and implement innovative and exciting intergenerational, curriculum-based, hands-on educational opportunities for kids.

Our Art & Technology Programs take place at schools, in our studios, and in community centers. Students produce final projects in the form of radio shows, sound collages, professional music and/or spoken voice recordings, historical audio documentation, oral history recordings and more!

The Washington State Essential Academic Learning Requirements are completely integrated into all of our programs.

We welcome your questions and/or proposals for new and different educational programs. Please email education@jackstraw.org for more information.

Youth Stories

Hamilton International Middle School ELL students, both beginning and intermediate, will take the next step in their project and record their three-person plays in the Jack Straw studios. The stories were written in conjunction with 826 Seattle. Jack Straw vocal coaches worked with the students at their school to rehearse and prepare them to record, make sound effects, and produce their plays.

Kimball third graders will wrap up our Family Celebrations audio project with a community potluck at Kimball School. Parents and students will bring the special holiday food they talked about in their stories. We'll all listen to their recordings as we feast. Each student will receive a CD of all the students' work at the potluck.

Foster High School ELL students will celebrate a new anthology and CD of their arrival stories at one of several celebratory events. All of the students' audio poems were broadcast on KBCS-FM during April for national poetry month.

Youth with Disabilities

We're in the planning stages for a new project for students with muscular dystrophy. Later in May, a group of elementary school students will produce flash dramas and interview each other about things that are important to them, such as what it's like to look at the world from their wheelchairs. This project is an expansion of our work with youth with visual impairments.

Youth Arts & Music

Other May projects include a follow-up music editing session with a 7-piece jazz ensemble from University Preparatory Academy (sax, clarinet, 2 guitars, bass, piano, and drums). Students are both performing and learning about the recording process. Fifth and six graders from Chestnut Hill Academy will be recording songs they wrote during a four-week songwriting project.

We're also working with SEED and Franklin High School on the Young Playwrights Festival. In conjunction with the festival, our Jack Straw/AIR producer-in-residence Yuko Kodama is talking with students about their plays, recording actors, gathering audience feedback, and producing a radio piece for broadcast on KBCS-FM.

In the News

West Seattle Herald highlights
Jack Straw education programs, artist

The West Seattle Herald published a feature on our recent school project with students from West Seattle Elementary. Teacher, theater artist and Jack Straw Writers Program alumnus Laurel Ann White led the students through voice and performance activities in the studios. You can read the feature online here.


Audio Production Workshops

We offer a variety of audio production, studio recording, and audio art classes. Examples of past courses include Introduction and Intermediate Pro Tools, Producing Radio Features, Sound Design and Soundscaping, Intro to Studio Recording, and Microphone Demonsration. Click here for class descriptions.



Highlights from past Jack Straw education projects:

Radio Shorties: 2006 Seattle Center Academy
Listen to Sounds of the 2006 Seattle Center Academy

Hamilton International Middle School



Current and Recent Projects

Blind Youth Audio Project
Offered by Jack Straw Productions, with the support of Arts and Visually Impaired Audiences (AVIA)

Jack Straw Productions, Foster High School, and KBCS 91.3 FM Community Radio present

Stories of Arrival

Seattle Poet and 2008 Jack Straw Writer Merna Ann Hecht worked with Foster High School students from around the world to write poems about their experiences, for a project titled Stories of Arrival, produced with support from The Voices Education Project in Seattle; The Institute for Poetic Medicine; Bread for the Journey; The Tukwila School District; the Tukwila Arts Commission; the Washington State Arts Commission; and the National Endowment for the Arts. We present these poems for April, National Poetry Month.

The Stories of Arrival poems will be broadcast during the KBCS "Daily Planet" show on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays at 4:30pm; and during the KBCS "One World Report," 6-7 pm, on Thursdays:

Monday, April 6, during Daily Planet: Nallely Hernandez
Tuesday, April 7, during Daily Planet: Seth Vyamungu
Wednesday, April 8, during Daily Planet: Roda Mohamed
Thursday, April 9, during One World Report: Sevda Lomanova, Buntu Redempter, Carlos Bautista, Jamila Aga, Ben Pinzari

Monday, April 13, during Daily Planet: Maryam Sami
Tuesday, April 14, during Daily Planet: Nazria Aydinova
Wednesday, April 15, during Daily Planet: Mawada Hamam
Thursday, April 16, during One World Report: Adifatah Said, Khalida Lomanova, Huong Vo, Shakir Khurshudova, Timur Chakhalov

Monday, April 20, during Daily Planet: Bello Dondja
Tuesday, April 21, during Daily Planet: Quynh Ngo
Wednesday, April 22, during Daily Planet: Tila Acharya
Thursday, April 23, during One World Report: Ruslan Gulaliyev, Hodan Warsame, Luis Ramirez, Elmira Binaliyeva, Merali Abdullayev

Monday, April 27, during Daily Planet: Monia Hamam
Tuesday, April 28, during Daily Planet: Shillah Sami
Wednesday, April 29, during Daily Planet: Vuong Ngo
Thursday, April 30, during One World Report: Adifatah Said, Khalida Lomanova, Erick Garcia, Dinara Chakholova, Leila Ali, Ruveyda Chkhalidze, Gulmira Chakholova

KBCS 91.3 FM is a listener supported, non-commercial, community radio station, operated as a public service of Bellevue Community College. "The Daily Planet" features music that spans continents, genres, and musical styles. "One World Report" is a weekly, community-centered, hour-long news and public affairs show produced by KBCS volunteers. The program airs Thursdays at 6 pm.





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