The Right Brain Initiative’s three-day arts education seminar provides creative tools for classrooms

Issued May 19, 2011

Imagine This! A Seminar on Bringing Creativity to Classrooms
Monday, June 20 – Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Portland Art Museum
1219 SW Park Avenue, Portland

Open to educators of all subjects and disciplines
See full schedule of sessions and register by June 15 at: http://imaginethis2011.eventbrite.com
Cost: $250; single-day option $100

The Right Brain Initiative, the arts education partnership of the Regional Arts & Culture Council, invites classrooms teachers, arts specialists, principals, curriculum directors and teaching artists of all disciplines to put their imaginations to work at Imagine This!, a three-day seminar. This second-annual summit unique to the Portland area is designed to help a wide range of educators broaden their ability to integrate creativity into the K-8 classroom setting.

Seminar participants will choose from 22 different sessions led by local and national arts education experts. These inspiring and practical workshops, studio sessions and stories from the field will provide tools that educators can apply directly to their daily work. Sessions include “Integrate-Stimulate-Create: Connecting Art and Math,” “Two Brains are Better than One: The Value of Collaboration,” and “Creating Creators: National Trends in Arts Education.” Another unique addition to this year’s symposium, “Imaginarium” sessions will lead all conference participants to collectively explore how to make artworks a connector for a school’s entire learning community, drawing upon the contemporary installation A Home and Country Should Leave Us No More (this installation will be on view at the Portland Building May 23 – June 17).

Featured guest presenters include Brian Davis of the internationally acclaimed band Pink Martini, who will lead participants through an inspiring demonstration of community building through rhythm; and Garry Golden, a nationally recognized futurist/forecaster traveling from New York City to provide a provocative presentation on the future of learning.

Through professional development for teachers and artists, The Right Brain Initiative boosts the ability of the region’s educators to provide high quality arts experiences, furthering the program’s long-term vision to ensure that every single K-8 student in the Portland metropolitan area receives creative learning opportunities. Right Brain recently received a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts in support of Imagine This! and its other professional development programming.

**Space is extremely limited; please register by June 15th at http://imaginethis2011.eventbrite.com.

Featured Speakers and Workshop Leaders

Deborah Brzoska is a national leader in arts education who presents professional development for teachers and teaching artists across the country on behalf of The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. A former dancer and teacher, she was also the founding principal of The Vancouver School of Arts & Academics, the award winning arts-based public school in Washington State. In addition to serving on the editorial board of the Teaching Artist Journal, Deb has written about arts education for The Kennedy Center, Chicago’s Project AIM, the Arts Education Partnership and The College Board.

Percussionist Brian Lavern Davis is an original member of the internationally acclaimed band Pink Martini. He has toured and/or recorded with such names as Herbie Hancock, Kalapana, Upepo, Obo Addy and Dub Squad, and has performed with symphonies across North America and Europe. Also a long-time educator, Brian teaches body percussion and samba locally and throughout the U.S., Asia, Australia, Brazil and New Zealand. He is the founder and director of both the Lions of Batucada, an ever-growing Brazilian dance and percussion ensemble, and the Ainsworth Jr. Escola, a 117-member Portland youth samba bateria. He has served on the faculties of Portland State University, Jefferson Performing Arts High School, and The Vancouver School of Arts & Academics. Brian is native of Portland, Oregon.

Garry Golden is a professionally trained futurist who speaks and consults on issues shaping society and business in the 21st century. Garry has consulted on a wide range of projects related to the future of infrastructure for energy and transportation, education/learning, emerging markets, social technologies and the implications of demographic transitions. Garry teaches an online course on The Future of Energy & Environment through the University of Houston Future Studies department, the program from which he received his Master of Science degree.

Dr. Dennie Palmer Wolf is a principal researcher at WolfBrown, a market research and non-profit consultancy based in Cambridge, MA. Former senior scholar at the Annenberg Institute for School Reform at Brown University, she trained as a researcher at Harvard Project Zero, where she led studies on the early development of artistic and symbolic capacities. She also directed Project PACE (Projects in Active Cultural Engagement) at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. More recently, Dennie has pioneered evaluation studies that build the capacities of organizations, funders, and the communities they serve.

The Right Brain Initiative is a sustainable partnership of public schools, local government, foundations, businesses and the cultural community, which launched its programming in Portland area classrooms in January 2009. The program’s goal is to achieve a measurable impact on learning by integrating the community’s arts and cultural resources into the education of every K-8 student in the Portland metropolitan region’s school districts. The Right Brain Initiative is a project of the Regional Arts & Culture Council, with Young Audiences of Oregon & SW Washington serving as Implementation Partner. Read more online at www.TheRightBrainInitiative.org.

The Regional Arts & Culture Council is the local arts agency for Clackamas, Multnomah and Washington Counties, providing grants for artists, schools and nonprofit organizations; conducting workplace giving for arts and culture (“Work for Art”) and other advocacy efforts; presenting workshops and other forms of technical assistance; providing printed and web-based resources for artists; and integrating art into public spaces. Online at www.racc.org.