The document discusses how arts education programs at organizations like the Fort Lauderdale Children's Theatre and Broward Center for the Performing Arts' Rose Miniaci Arts Education Center are helping address declines in arts education funding in schools. These programs teach students valuable skills like confidence, empathy, taking direction, and applying feedback through experiences like singing classes, theatre productions, and workshops that connect to performances. The Broward Center in particular has expanded its facilities and outreach to provide more educational opportunities to students across Broward County.

1. Jacob Greene, 16,
portrays Munkustrap
in a Fort Lauderdale
Children's Theatre
production of Cats.
PHOTOGRAPHY:DARRENHANDLER

2. BY JENNIFER LIMA
LEARNING
TAKES
CENTER
STAGEIn recent years, arts education has often found itself
on the back‑burner in U.S. schools. Now though, local
arts institutions are part of a growing trend to let kids
experience the joys and possibilities of the arts.

3. 56 December 2015 | FLMag.com Find us on:
THE STUDENTS form a complete
circle in the center of the room.
“Where do you get your power?”
belts Holder. “Your breath!” re-
plies the class in complete unison. A series
of vocal exercises follow, starting off with a
capella singing and ending with songs by the
piano. There’s a nervous kind of excitement in
the air as they return to their seats and wait
their turns to take the floor and sing solo. Tif-
fany is the first to brave the crowd.
She walks down to the floor, takes her spot
in the center, locks eyes with the back wall
at about row 10 and starts singing. Her first
go at it shows that she’s still pretty nervous
and a little uncomfortable in her movements.
She’s preparing for her upcoming audition
in the St. Mark’s School production of Shrek
– she’s going for Princess
Fiona - by singing “I Think I
Got You Beat.” Jodie Langel,
a Broadway actress turned
Florida teacher, stands up
skills that can easily be applied to
everyday life in the adult world too.
In schools across the country many
of these classes have been left be-
hind thanks to budget cuts and the
push towards standardized testing.
But in Fort Lauderdale and through-
out South Florida, there are quite a
few organizations that recognize
the power of arts education and are
fighting to keep it alive.
Organizations such as the Fort
Lauderdale Children’s Theatre and
Broward Center for the Performing
Arts’ Rose Miniaci Arts Education
Center serve to build in children and teenag-
ers a foundation for self-confidence and the
ability to empathize with others. Students
learn how to put themselves in other peo-
ple’s (or characters’) shoes in order to better
understand their situations and ultimately,
their actions as well.
While they’re at it, they also learn music
and literature, perhaps some psychology and
science, and other academically useful things
that don’t necessarily have to come from a
traditional classroom. And working under
the direction of professional stage actors and
artists teaches them how to take direction and
feedback and turn it into something positive.
IT’SA WEDNESDAY NIGHT in an upstairs room at the Broward
Center. Vocal coach and musical theater teacher Tammy
Holder takes her place in front of a roomful of teenagers and lets them
know that they’ll be singing their songs in class today. But before they
start she wants to hear about the “magical musical moments” they’ve
had this week. • EAGER to share their moments, the students take their
seats as she begins roll call. Joila got tickets for Once. Shamila discovered
that her friend loves to sing. Tiffany rehearsed for Jesus Christ Superstar
at the Fort Lauderdale Children’s Theatre. Time for warm-ups.
and walks into Tiffany’s line of vision - to
that spot in row 10. Talk to me, sing it to me,
I’m Shrek, she says. “Oh what, you’re a little
princess in a tower? Like your life is so bad?
Boo-hoo,” she taunts.
And that’s all it takes. The once unsure stu-
dent blooms into a teen Fiona and replaces her
nervous movements with sass and attitude.
“Always remember to keep going,” Langel
tells the class. “When you look back, you’re
not being confident.”
That’s a lesson that can be applied to more
than just musical theater. The analytical and
social skills necessary for theater, the skills
being taught in art education classes, are
BELOW: The
Rose Miniaci
Arts Education
Center.
RIGHT: Kids
rehearse inside.
PHOTOGRAPHY:DOUGCASTANEDO
LEARNING TAKES
CENTER STAGE

4. FLMag.com | December 2015
57
LEARNING
BY DOING
COMING OFF of a recent
fundraising initiative that
raised about $59 million,
the Broward Center has
never been more focused on bringing
arts education into the classroom. A large
portion of the funds raised went towards
two new buildings—the Huizenga Pavil-
ion and the Rose Miniaci Arts Education
Center, two facilities that help create a
place where arts and education can come
together. The center is also placing a large
focus on community involvement and
outreach for children in South Florida.
Through its partnership with the
Broward County Student Enrichment
in the Arts (SEAS) program, local public
schools are invited to bring students to
experience theater up close inside the
center’s Amaturo Theater, as well as to
participate in a variety of classes, lec-
tures and demonstrations. In order to
make the same educational opportuni-
ties available to all students, including
those in private schools and those who
are homeschooled, Smart Stage was
created. Similar to SEAS, the program
facilitates close-up theater experiences,
classes, lectures and demonstrations for
students in Broward County. Additional-
ly, both programs have a component that
incorporates the context of the shows
the students watch into an interactive
workshop before or after the show.
“Kids learn by doing,” says Jan Good-
heart, vice president of external affairs
for the center. Those kinds of on-your-
feet learning exercises expose students
to programs directly connected with
the shows they see and create a richer
learning experience.
As the second largest public school sys-
tem in Florida and the sixth largest in the
country, Broward County Schools has also
joined forces with the national initiative
Turnaround: Arts. Based out of Washing-
ton, D.C., it works to bring arts education
resources into high-needs schools and
use it as a strategic tool for targeting larger
challenges and opportunities.
The Rose Miniaci Arts Education Cen-
ter offers many class options for all ages.
The classes encourage creative expres-
sion and work to teach students new
skills through the performing arts.
“My whole purpose in life is to find a
way to connect arts to anything,” says
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5. 58 December 2015 | FLMag.com Find us on:
Tammy Holder, who joined the Broward
Center in 2008. Through the center’s
partnerships, she also serves as a pro-
fessional development coach with local
schoolteachers to help them infuse arts
education into their regular lesson plans.
While arts education bridges the gap
for many students in terms of their learn-
ing style, it also helps others uncover a
world of creative freedom and passion.
After participating in the center’s theater
summer camp this year, eight-year-old
Emilie Kaplan has found her calling.
“She drives me crazy,” says her moth-
er, Olga Kolker. “She’s singing nonstop
and my little one is four years old, so she
repeats after her and she knows all the
songs of all the plays she does.”
Kolker searched for a program where her
daughter would be taught by professionals
and grow to have a deeper understanding
for the craft, and she says that she’s found
the place. For her, it was about more than
just finding something for her daughter to
do after school - more than just giving her
a hobby. It was about allowing her to learn
a craft and build up her confidence in a real
way, a confidence that would remain with
her throughout every stage of her life.
Another student at the center, Kaylie Guz-
man, only gave acting a chance at her step-
mother’s suggestion. The Broward Center was
putting together a summer production of In
the Heights. She listened to the music, and
she was immediately hooked. Guzman, 16,
had no idea what it took to put on a full-scale
production until she came to the center. But
like many of the students taking classes there,
she learned very quickly just how much hard
work is needed to get a musical theater pro-
duction off the ground and onto the stage.
Tammy
Holder leads a
singing class.
PHOTOGRAPHY:GONZALOVILLOTA
LEARNING TAKES
CENTER STAGE

6. FLMag.com | December 2015
59
A LOCAL
MAINSTAY’S NEW
GENERATION
ALTHOUGH THE Broward Cen-
ter is a big part of the arts ed-
ucation initiative in Broward
County, other key players do
their fair share to keep arts in the class-
room. A staple of Fort Lauderdale life since
the 1950s, the Fort Lauderdale Children’s
Theatre was the first documented children’s
theater in Florida. What started out as a the-
ater in a garage run by two mothers trying
to find a way for their children to express
themselves has grown into a full-scale pro-
duction house, now located in an upstairs
corner of The Galleria shopping center. The
theater, which offers a variety of hands-on
training opportunities for kids, is broken
down into three branches: classes, produc-
tion and community outreach.
The classes offered range from suitable
material for ages four to 18, with various
focuses on acting, musical theater, singing,
dancing and even stage production. The
classes are taught by theater professionals,
many with backgrounds in Broadway and
national touring theaters.
“We really believe that the best and
brightest need to work with young people
too,” says Janet Erlick, the theater’s execu-
tive artistic director.
Eleven-year-old Danielle Jost has had a
love for the stage since she was six years old.
PHOTOGRAPHY:DARRENHANDLER
An FLCT alumnus, John Corby, 22, portrays the Cat
in the Hat and Michael Guarasci, 13, plays JoJo in
the Fort Lauderdale Children's Theatre summer 2015
production of Seussical the Musical. FLCT's summer
productions are special because they allow adults,
parents, and alumni to audition for the shows.
She favors singing and dancing classes,
where she says resident vocal instructor
Rachal Solomon helps her project and
learn more about being the best that she
can be. The dance class, taught by res-
ident dance instructor and choreogra-
pher Ron Hutchins, helps her learn new
steps and develop as a dancer. According
to her father, David Jost, who also brings
13-year-old son Dylan to the program:
“This is their home away from home …
where they develop and they grow.”
Plays are run by the students with
the exception of four professionals:
Lead director, artistic director, costume
designer and scenic designer. Students
fill all other roles from the acting to the
soundboard to the lighting. While this
means a somewhat longer tech-week full of
late nights and early mornings, Erlick says,
the hands-on experience the students receive
by producing their own shows is invaluable
to their lives, whether they seek a life in the
theater or on Wall Street.
For some students, the theater experience
leads to unexpected places, including science
and technology. Seventeen-year-old Casey
Guarasci first came to the theater in 2008
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7. 60 December 2015 | FLMag.com
for acting classes but soon realized that
her true passion was behind the scenes.
“I didn’t really know tech existed un-
til I came here,” she says. “I started in-
terning with the director - his name is
Sean Cutler - and he taught me all about
lighting design and I fell in love with it.”
Now a high school student at Broward
College-affiliated College Academy, she is
taking college courses towards a degree in
electrical engineering.
The season consists of five shows in
total. That’s five learning opportunities
for students to get real-life experience in
what it takes to run a theater production,
what it takes to act in one, and what it
means to work as a team. The intimate
feel of the theater and its blend of real
life behind-the-scenes experiences gives
students a realistic idea of what life in the
world of theater entails.
“Our shows here are very intimate and
very intense. You really get that close-up
feeling in theater,” says the theater’s
community relations manager, Lau-
ren Formica, who is also a Fort Lau-
derdale Children's Theatre alumnus.
Two of the shows are geared to-
wards middle and high school stu-
dents. This season those productions
are Jesus Christ Superstar and Les
Miserables. This season’s two all-ages
productions are Mulan Jr. and Beauty
and the Beast Jr. The theater’s deep
roots in the community are evident
in productions like Beauty and the
Beast Jr., where two of the current
students in the cast are the daughters
of the actress who played leading lady
Belle in the production’s last reprise
in the early ’90s. Paige O’Hara, the
voice of Belle in the original Disney
film, is also a Fort Lauderdale Chil-
dren’s Theatre alumnus.
The final show in the season is a
community theater production that
includes both children and adults,
and is often an opportunity for fam-
ilies to do something creative and
educational together. This season’s
community theater production will
be Singing in the Rain. That dance-
heavy show will serve to further
push the theater’s recent advances
towards more dance classes and op-
portunities for students.
The theater also focuses on
community outreach. Since 1992
it has offered in-school programs
that aim to give students what
they need in order to grow artistically
and creatively. Focusing on more that just
theater, one of the prominent in-school
programs is “A Bridge from Me to You,”
an anti-bullying and conflict-resolution
program that coaches students and edu-
cators on how to handle differences and
build a sense of community. Another
program, and one with more of a theater
component, is “From Page to Stage,” a
reading comprehension and literacy pro-
gram. It focuses on one novel and uses
theater in the classroom to help students
make the connections as they read and go
through the story by allowing them to act
out what’s happening.
“A lot of the skills that acting teaches
in general are about putting yourself in
someone else’s perspective, looking at
the world through that lens and really
teaching empathy and ways to connect
and understand the community around
you,” Erlick says.
Camryn
Handler, 15,
as the Sour
Kangaroo
in Seussical
the Musical.
PHOTOGRAPHY:DARRENHANDLER
Brendan Hardie (right), 15, gets
Tedrick Wilson's, 15, mic ready
for sound check backstage an
FLCT production of The Wiz.
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61Find us on:
MAKING STEM
INTO STEAM
AS LOCAL THEATER GROUPS
partner with schools to take
arts education to more children,
they’re part of a larger trend. For
many years, arts education took a back seat.
But now, many educators are seeing it as a
necessary part of learning and are looking
for ways to bring it back.
Lynda Fender Hayes, an education profes-
sor and director of the P.K. Yonge Develop-
mental Research School at the University of
Florida, says there are obstacles – but that ed-
ucators are working to build arts education in
the classroom. A heavier focus on testing and
student assessments has led to a short supply
of time to spend on things such as field trips,
hands-on learning for students and work
outside what are often called the STEM sub-
jects – science, technology, engineering and
math. Now though, school leaders often ref-
erence STEAM – STEM plus arts – when dis-
cussing what they want in schools. The focus
has shifted from removing the arts to finding
ways to connect the subject to students.
“I’ve seen increasing numbers of super-
intendents and school leaders prioritizing
restoring the arts programs in their schools
and districts,” Hayes says.
“One of the greatest challenges to K-12
school leaders and teachers is trying to
figure out how you balance your time. You
only have so much time in a school day. It’s
always your finite resource.”
The educational arts experience being
brought into the classroom is something
that teaches more than an art form or tech-
nique, she says. The arts facilitate creative
thinking, flexibility of thought, critical
thinking and the ability to explore some-
thing through multiple connections, all of
which are skills that foster positive growth
and a successful life of learning.
But while teachers continue to assess the
best ways to balance their student’s educa-
tional experiences, parents can actively ad-
dress the lack of arts education their children
receive in school by enrolling them in local
programs like the ones at the Broward Center
or the Fort Lauderdale Children’s Theatre.
The educational programs available be-
come more than just activities for the chil-
dren to be involved in and can serve to bring
people together.
“There’s a really strong community of par-
ents,” dad David Jost says of Fort Lauderdale
Children’s Theatre. “There are a lot of fami-
lies that come from out west and come from
other areas, and without even having to ini-
tiate it there’s carpooling and there’s people
getting together after the shows.”
The children attending theater classes
might not know they’re getting something
that education experts believe is beneficial,
but they do see that they’re getting some-
thing fun and different from their daily
schoolwork. Emilie Kaplan, the eight-year-
old who takes classes at the Broward Center
and never stops singing, is straightforward
about what she loves.
“They have very entertaining things,” she
says. “Like you get to do more things than in
a normal class. You do music. You play the
piano and then sing. It’s more than that - I
like the class very much."
LEARNING TAKES
CENTER STAGE
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