News | Arts For The Schools

Mexican Heritage Festival is Happening!

9/9/2021

Arts For The Schools will host our first Mexican Heritage Festival on October 9, 2021 in honor of the national Hispanic Heritage month. The festival will honor Latino cultural traditions and will include live music, dance, arts, artisan vendors, crafts, food and games.  In addition to supporting and celebrating Mexican artists, the festival will be an opportunity to promote and support local and Mexican-owned businesses, to increase their economic stability during Truckee’s economic off-season (which runs in the fall September – Nov).

The festival will be the first of its kind ever-held in Truckee, and include live performances; arts and crafts; food and games. At the heart of the festival will be a stage with live performances with regional and California performers including Mariachi and folk musicians and traditional Mexican Ballet Folklórico.  Live performances and activities will occur during the day from 12-8pm.  Local Mexican restaurants and business owners will sell food and drinks.  Arts, crafts, and games will be open to everyone including lotería.  In booths throughout the festival, local small-business vendors will be selling goods available to purchase such as clothing and jewelry.

A dedicated booth will house a festival learning center that will include a display and kids activities to learn about the history of Mexican Independence Day, and Hispanic Heritage Month.  We will be collecting stories from local residents about their lives in Truckee.

One of Arts For The Schools founding tenants is to promote cultural understanding and learning. We have a deep commitment to equality and cultural learning. With a deep commitment to build community and cultural understanding, Arts For The Schools has for the last 36 years worked to promote cultural diversity and learning through our onSTAGE Live and Performing Arts programs. Arts For The Schools has 36 years of experience presenting and hosting culture performances and events in our service area in the rural communities of North Lake Tahoe. Since 2013, we have deepened our commitment to honor and celebrate our LatinX families, students and residents through hosting Latino and Mexican artists, performances and workshops.

Are you a creative, fun, collaborative art teacher?

8/9/2021

The ideal candidate will have a minimum of five years’ experience teaching visual art to children, excellent curriculum planning skills, be flexible and organized, be kind and friendly, with the ability to create lesson plans that enable students to gain a deep understanding of art utilizing more than one art form and media. The position is responsible for teaching visual arts curriculum in a variety of school classrooms.

Arts For The Schools is a 36-year-old non-profit with the mission is to inspire, teach and build our rural communities through equitable access to the arts and arts education. Arts For The Schools has partnered with local schools in our service area to teach visual arts classes since 1989 and has effective partnerships with regional schools to offer arts education courses. With the recent retirement of one of our long-time teachers, we are looking for a deeply committed art teacher to work with local students in K-5th grades.

The position would be responsible for teaching multiple classrooms and be available to teach 4-5 days per week, during school hours of 8:00am-3:00pm. The position is a contract position for the 21-22 school-year, with the potential to contract in future years.
Reports to CEO.
Independent work, with in-person meetings each week.
Contract for 35 hours per week.
Contract rate $40/hour.
Deadline to apply August 23,2021

Minimum Qualifications:

Experienced in teaching visual art to children, a minimum of 5 or more years required
Experienced in using diverse art media, expertise in teaching ceramics is required
Must be highly flexible
Ability to work collaboratively with K-12 teachers
Excellent teaching, communication and interpersonal skills
Ability to work independently
Able to take direction well, be a collaborator, team member and be a leader

Strong organization skills
Have excellent ability to manage classroom environment effectively

Strong community ties in Truckee and North Lake Tahoe
Excellent basic computer skills (word processing, spread sheet, data base, email and internet experience)
Excellent history of attendance and on-time performance
Experienced in developing K-8th visual art curriculum preferred
Bachelors degree in Fine Arts preferred

Click Read More to learn how to apply

Arts For The Schools is immediately looking for a Mexican Heritage Festival Manager

8/9/2021

mhfc_job_description.pdf
File Size:	63 kb
File Type:	pdf

POSITION SUMMARY:
Arts For The Schools is a 36-year-old non-profit committed to cultural learning and community building. Arts For The Schools mission is to inspire, teach and build our rural communities through equitable access to the arts and arts education. The position is responsible for managing and coordinating Arts For The Schools’ new annual Mexican Heritage Festival. This position is responsible for performing highly-skilled administrative and event duties with expertise in events, customer service, and clerical skills. The position is a temporary, contract, remote position with the potential to lead to future events management work.

The Mexican Heritage Festival will honor Mexican and Hispanic cultural traditions and will be centered on Mexican music, and cultural and artistic traditions, while highlighting local businesses. The goals of the festival are to honor and celebrate Mexican heritage, build community ties and opportunities for cultural learning, and to provide economic opportunities for Mexican-owned and local businesses.

One of Arts For The Schools founding tenants is to promote cultural understanding and learning through the arts. We have a deep commitment to equality and cultural learning. Arts For The Schools has for the last 36 years worked to promote cultural diversity and learning through our onSTAGE Live Program for the public and in our Performing Arts Program for schools, by presenting and hosting culture performances and events in the rural communities of North Lake Tahoe. Since 2013, we have deepened our commitment to honor and celebrate our Mexican families and students, through hosting Latino and Mexican artists, performances and workshops. The festival is an extension of this ongoing work.

Reports to CEO.
Remote work, with in-person meetings each week.
Contract for 20 hours per week.
Contract rate $25-$27/hour.
Deadline to apply August 16, 2021

DUTIES:
Oversee and assist the leadership committee with all event-planning duties including:

Soliciting corporate sponsors and communicating with sponsors.
Distributing marketing (posters, banners, tickets etc.)
Creating social media posts about events and posting to online calendars.
Recruiting volunteers and manage volunteer list to ensure successful event.
Scheduling event production, ordering tables, chairs, etc. for day of event.
Coordinating day of event production such as directing vendors, volunteers, setting up and staging the event, etc.

ESSENTIAL QUALIFICATIONS AND ABILITIES:

Excellent communication skills, both written and verbal and excellent phone etiquette.

Bilingual in English and Spanish is required.

Ability to work independently.
Able to take direction well and be a leader, using good listening skills.
Strong organization skills.
Strong community ties in Truckee and North Lake Tahoe.
Excellent basic computer skills (word processing, spread sheet, data base, email and internet experience).
Excellent public relations and customer service skills.
Ability to perform as an effective team member.
Ethical business practices.
Excellent history of attendance and on-time performance.

Read More to learn how to apply.

Wooden Boat Challenge 21 Is On!

8/2/2021

Arts For The Schools 6th annual Wooden Boat Challenge is Saturday, Aug 14th from 11am-6pm at Commons Beach in Tahoe City. Check out this crazy competition! Teams of four, have three hours to build a boat, and then test their wit and skill by racing them on Lake Tahoe! Bring the whole family to watch the race and support the cause, by joining the kids crafts, face painting, or buying lunch or a cool beverage in the food and beer tent.

Admission is free! Bring your chair and join us for the whole day on Saturday, Aug14th, 11am to 6pm at Commons Beach in Tahoe City.
Support the cause by buying lunch or a cold beverage in the food or beer tent, or doing a kids craft or face painting. Food Booth will have hamburgers, hot dogs, chips, cookies, cool drinks, boxed water (to save the environment) and treats.
All of the proceeds will go directly to Arts For The Schools programming for kids.
Special THANKS to: Truckee Tahoe Lumber Company the Wooden Boat Challenge LEAD SPONSOR, and KEY EVENT SPONSORS Hartline Construction, McEneaney Construction, Mountain Hardware and Sports, and Jim Morrison Construction.

Live Shows Returning This Fall

7/16/2021

We are excited to announce that the 36th onSTAGE Live season will continue this fall. We are working with agents and artists from all over the US to plan live performances and master classes for our region.

We are working with state-wide partners on best practices and planning to ensure the safety of all audience members with enhanced safety and sanitation protocols.

We already have several amazing artists booked to perform, and look forward to enjoying live performances with you again!

Look for the season announcement, ticket sales and more details in October!

The Mural Project

7/1/2021

Arts For The Schools Announces New Partnership to Develop Public Art Murals In North Lake Tahoe
[Truckee, CA] – Arts For The Schools is honored to announce a new a public art project in partnership with Dia de los Muertos North Lake Tahoe and the North Tahoe Business Association. The Mural Project, a program of Arts For The Schools, is a collaboration to beautify the concrete walls located in front of businesses with artistic murals, in the heart of North Lake Tahoe communities. The art will convey important local themes of environmental stewardship, history and cultural heritage, with the goal of bringing attention to local small businesses. The hope is the art will add to North Lake Tahoe community identity for years to come.

The group has two murals planned for this year in Kings Beach, CA and hopes to ultimately complete nine locations in Kings Beach, and expand to other North Lake communities in the near future.

“We hope the project will enhance community enrichment, identity, and cohesion, and the art will allow everyone in the community and visitors alike, to experience art in the course of daily life. As an added benefit, the project will highlight small, local businesses and this project is a special way to show how the arts can contribute to making local communities better.” says Eve McEneaney, Arts For The Schools CEO.

The Mural Project plans to work with regional artists to design and paint the murals, as well as reserve a few for student groups, providing students with a hands-on learning experience.

Goodbye to Anke, a beloved teaching artist

6/28/2021

We say goodbye to Anke C. Hass our long-time, beloved teaching artist, who is retiring for a move to a new state and to spend time with her beautiful grandchildren. Anke has been a key part of Arts For The Schools for the last 17 years. We are tremendously grateful for her leadership, kindness and commitment to teach art to local students.

During Anke's time she taught thousands of local students in Arts For The Schools Visual Arts Program. Anke's work with Arts For The Schools included developing a high-level fine arts curriculum, and large student collaborative projects.

Anke is also a beautiful professional artist and is known for her portraits and oil paintings.

We know she will have a big impact on her new town. We will miss her dearly!

Postponed Mexican Heritage Festival to September

5/4/2021

Truckee's first Mexican Heritage Festival has been postponed for a second time due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Arts For The Schools was hopeful we could host the festival in honor of Cinco De Mayo, but to ensure the safety of our community and to help keep our cases low, we have decided to postpone the festival until Mexican Independence Day, September 16-18, 2021. The Mexican Heritage Festival will celebrate the contributions of Mexican Americans and Mexican businesses to our town and the success of our region. The festival will include live music, a digital museum, arts and more!

Arts For The Schools has partnered with the Town of Truckee to develop the festival, that was originally scheduled for September 19, 2020 in honor of Mexican Independence Day. Mexican-owned businesses contact us to participate! We are looking for planning committee members, food vendors, musicians and table vendors!

***Watch for updates coming this summer about musical acts, opportunities to table or be a vendor.

Arts For The Schools FY 2020 Impact

4/30/2021

When 2020 began, Arts For The Schools never expected what was to come. We are honored to have been able to continue to teach students online, provide community art classes online to parents and children at home, and even offer some digital live performances!

We worked tirelessly to ensure our programs could continue even with tremendous budget cuts. Read about the impact we had on students and the community in 2020 in our annual report here.

Our Commitment to Social Justice & Equity

4/2/2021

Arts For The Schools was founded, 36 years ago, to improve access to the arts, improve cultural awareness and cultural competence among our youth and our rural communities. The foundational tenets of our work has been providing cultural learning opportunities for our children and the public, and a space for the arts to be the pathway to community building and learning.

In 2015 our vision pivoted more towards racial equity, and equitable access became our guiding principle in all of our work and programs. We uphold these tenets, by delivering our programs and resources equitably among those we serve and take in account equity in all of our decisions, distribution of resources and programming. Since 2015, we have implemented data tracking tools to evaluate and ensure accountability and expand transparency in our programs.

Our programming focuses on providing economic opportunities for artists of color, artists of all ethnicities, of all abilities, genders, and sexual orientations. Through programming, we provide a public space for the messages of equality within the larger community and most importantly share this message with our young people, to promote a more inclusive, tolerant and equitable world.

Plan
We are committed to continuing to uphold our tradition of cultural learning work, community building and equitable access. We are committed to promoting equality in our work for all people: people of color, indigenous people, people of all abilities and sexual orientations. We know we have more work to do. We are committed to finding ways to continue to expand equity within our programs, for the people we serve, and in the community, at large. We will further develop this commitment in our 2021 strategic plan and focus on localized strategies and action steps, to strive to build our rural community as a place of equity and inclusion.

Celebrate Black History Month with Your Kids

2/22/2021

Celebrate Black History Month Feb 1- March 1!

Did you know Black History Month, or African American History Month, began as a weeklong celebration in 1926? Since the 1890s, Black communities celebrated the birthdays of two people considered to have a big impact on Black history in the US: Abraham Lincoln (February 12) and Frederick Douglass (February 14).

The theme for The Black History Month 2021 is “Black Family: Representation, Identity and Diversity” explores the African diaspora, and the spread of Black families across the United States.

Here are some ideas to teach your children about Black History:

1) Create a Black History Month collage with important historical figures such as Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King Jr. and President Barack Obama.

2) Join Tuesday, Feb. 23 Artists at Home: School Outreach Adapted from the museum’s summer program, “Artists at Home” is a digital interactive program designed to engage students with hands-on artmaking and conversations about African American artists and different visual art genres. Each hour-long session, led by an NMAAHC educator, encourages participants to make art using household materials and discuss the featured artist work. February’s sessions will focus on the works of Wadsworth Jarrell and word portraits. This program is for students from grades six–12. Admission is free; however, registration is required at https://nmaahc.si.edu/events/upcoming.

3) Re-enact a a black history month story book such as Harriet Tubman and the Underground Railroad.

For more details and ideas visit: https://kidactivities.net/black-history-month-activities-for-kids/

Happy Presidents Day!

2/15/2021

In honor of Presidents' Day and in recognition of Black History month, these wonderful kindergartens amazed us with their paintings of President Lincoln!

Arts For The Schools is teaching TTUSD students at home this year and students are learning so much while at home!

Spring Visual Arts & Music Classes begin Feb 1

2/8/2021

New Spring visual arts and music classes begin this week. A total of 18 new classrooms begin classes once per week and will continue until June.

Arts For The Schools packed thousands of art supplies to prepare for the free classes including:
2,042 acrylic paint cups
350 sets oil pastels
350 sets chalk pastels
400 print-making sets
400 colored pencils and sharpies
400 paint brushes
80 Mexican gourds and so much more!

Art teachers will continue to teach cohort C classes through the Spring at home as well. Students are enjoying classes that teach the fundamental techniques of visual arts and music and benefit from arts integrated curriculum, for free from Arts For The Schools.

Thank You Tahoe For Giving Back!

12/16/2020

We are so grateful to our community for giving so generously to raise money for teaching students at home! We raised $16,150 in just two weeks! Thank you for your support to help us win a Grand Challenge grant from the Tahoe Truckee Community Foundation of $1200! We want to thank the foundation for their hard work to organize the campaign and for the generous award.

A total of 51 donors gave including a matching gift from Truckee Tahoe Lumber Company. We feel so lucky to live in such a wonderful community.

We are well on the way to reaching our goal. Didn't get a chance to donate? There's still time before December 31st and get a tax write off too!

See who gave on social media and join the campaign!
https://www.facebook.com/Arts4theSchools

Join the Campaign

15 Days. 15 Reasons. To Give

12/2/2020

Today is the first day of Arts For The Schools' campaign to raise $75,000 to teach to public school students, at home and in the classroom this year.

Arts For The Schools will reach thousands of students and community members this year at home with online music, visual arts, and cultural performances.
There is still time to give.
https://www.givebacktahoe.org/organization/Arts-For-The-Schools

#givebacktahoe
#artsfortheschools

Giving Tuesday 2020, Not Just Another Tuesday

12/1/2020

December 1st, 2020 marks Giving Tuesday and the start of the Give Back Tahoe campaign this year. Today you can make a donation through Give Back Tahoe to help Arts For The Schools reach thousands of local kids at home this year with free arts education classes. Local students and families need our help now more than ever.

If you give a donation of $5 or more today, your gift can have an even greater impact. Giving on December 1st, could help Arts For The Schools win a Tahoe Truckee Community Foundation Give Back Tahoe Challenge Grant of $2500, reaching another 100 children with visual arts education while at home.

Giving Tuesday is the first day of a Arts For The Schools' month long campaign to raise $75,000 to teach Visual Arts Program courses to public school students online.

https://www.givebacktahoe.org/organization/Arts-For-The-Schools

Taj Mahal First Livestream Performance Nov 17!

11/9/2020

Arts For The Schools is proud to partner with the legendary, blues icon Taj Mahal, to bring you access to his first ever LIVESTREAM performance on November 17 at 6pm PT/9pm ET!

Tickets are $20 and on sale now at https://boxoffice.mandolin.com/pages/_go_/get-tickets?ref=4981:48821

Use the link above, and a portion of each ticket sold benefits Arts For The Schools arts education programming. Don’t miss this amazing show and chance to support local kids’ education.

Mexican Heritage Festival Announced!

11/2/2020

We invite you to join Truckee's 1st Mexican Heritage Festival. The Mexican Heritage Festival will celebrate the contributions of Mexican Americans and Mexican businesses to our town and the success of our region. The festival will include live music, a digital museum, arts and more!

Arts For The Schools has partnered with the Town of Truckee to develop the festival, that was originally scheduled for September 19, 2020 in honor of Mexican Independence Day. The festival has been postponed to May 5th-8th 2021.

Mexican-owned businesses contact us to participate! We are looking for planning committee members, food vendors, musicians and table vendors!

I want to particpate!

5th Wooden Boat Challenge, At Home A Success!

9/25/2020

The 5th annual Wooden Boat Challenge, At Home 2020 was a two day event, Sept 11th and 12th. Teams picked up a set of building materials to take home. Teams had only 3 hours to build their boat on Friday. Pre and post boat inspection happened via facetime.

On Saturday, every half an hour, 1 team came to the Lake Tahoe race course to test the quality and speed of their boat. The best times won first, second and funniest boat prizes.

Who Won?
Watch the video to find out! For more fun photos of the event or for updates on future events visit the WBC page:

https://www.artsfortheschools.org/wbc-347105-890860.html

Online Live Art Classes Have Begun!

9/16/2020

We are happy to say students will still be taught art at home by Arts For The Schools. It took a bit longer than 3 weeks to pack art supplies and deliver the bags to public schools in time for the family school supply pick up - the first and second weeks of September.

Every student received a bag of professional quality art supplies with acrylic paints, watercolor paints, oil pastels, soft pastels, print-making tools, colored pencils, professional art papers and more!

The cost of art supplies more than doubled this year, due to the requirement to provide each student with their own art supplies to meet COVID-19 sanitation protocols.

Thank you #NevadaCountyReliefFund for helping with the cost of art supplies!

Live online classes have begun!

This is the background of the Bottom Area shown below. It'll display correctly on published site.
If you don't want background for the bottom area, simply hover over the bottom of this image to delete it. The background of the bottom area will be a solid dark color.

VISIT OR MAIL
Administrative Office
11045 Donner Pass Road
Suite 2A
Truckee, CA 96161

PHONE
(530) 582-8278

EMAIL
a team member