K-12 Programs

K-12 School Day Performances

School Day Performances

Workshops for K-12 Students

For select School-Day Performances, a UMS teaching artist will visit your classroom and facilitate a 30- to 50-minute arts-integrated experience that is directly connected to school curricula and the performance. After the performance, the UMS teaching artist returns to your classroom to lead students in reflection and discussion.

These workshops are designed to actively explore the art form and themes that students will encounter during the performance, and, best of all, come at no additional charge to your school. Your students will deepen their experience as audience members and critical thinkers, while collaborating and connecting with each other, growing artistically and academically, and practicing their creative skills in the classroom.

2020/21 UMS Teaching Artists

Allen Dennard is a trumpeter, composer, and bandleader who was born and raised in the city of Detroit, Michigan. At the age of 9, Allen decided to join his elementary school’s band, John Trix Elementary. From then on he never put the trumpet down, finding a whole new passion for instrumental music. Throughout high school, he chose to play classical music, but around the 10th grade, he decided to dive into learning more about jazz. From then on he chose jazz as his musical style. He began to study players such as Freddie Hubbard, Miles Davis, Woody Shaw, Lee Morgan, and Roy Hargrove just to name a few. Around his senior year of high school, Allen had the privilege of being mentored by the great Marcus Belgrave, one of Detroit’s own legendary trumpeters.

Allen attended the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor where he received a full scholarship from the university’s jazz department. Allen has made three appearances as a sideman in the Detroit Jazz Festival, one with the great saxophonist Wendell Harrison (2015), with Detroit bassist Ali Bey (2017), and lastly with the Detroit Jazz Festival All-Star Alumni Band (2019). Allen is a bandleader and has three of his own groups, the Allen Dennard Trio, the Allen Dennard Quartet, and the Allen Dennard Quintet. All groups have been headliners in venues around Detroit, Metro-Detroit, and throughout Michigan, such as Baker’s Keyboard Lounge, Cliff Bell’s, The Dirty Dog Jazz Cafe, Bert’s Marketplace, The Blue Llama, The Whisky Parlor, etc.

Tariq Gardner is an electrifying drummer, composer, and educator from Detroit who has his roots in Detroit’s rich and storied jazz tradition. He was brought up in the music by his mother, bassist, Marion Hayden, who greatly impacted his musical knowledge and instinct. A broad lover of music, Tariq is driven to bring the worlds of Jazz, Neo-Soul, Hip-Hop, and live instrument oriented music together in the city.

A 2018 graduate of the University of Michigan’s Jazz Studies program, Tariq has served as the Drummer for the John Douglas Quartet from 2017-19, led groups at the Charles H. Wright Museum’s African World Fest in both 2017 and 2018, has performed with the Detroit Jazz Fest All-Star Alumni Band (a three-month residency featuring pianist Cameron Graves), played at the Detroit Jazz Festival (2018-2020) and at the Cape May Jazz Festival (2019). He continues to work as a drummer, composer, and bandleader for major events in and around Detroit (including his own group the Evening Star).

Susana Quintanilla is an educator (M.A. Bilingual Education) and a classically-trained Mexican folkloric dancer who began her studies at the Insituto Nacional de Bellas Artes in Mexico City. She studied under accomplished choreographers such as Amalia Hernández (Ballet Folklórico de México), Rafael Zamarripa (Universidad de Colima), Francisco Bravo (Insituto Nacional de Bellas Artes), Graciela Tapia (Los Angeles), Luz María Gallego (Pánuco, Veracruz) and Miguel Vélez (Universidad de Veracruz).

As director of El Ballet Folklórico Estudiantil (EBFE), Maestra Susana organized and produced the Midwest Folkloric Dance Workshops, Folkloric Dance Seminars for students in Mexico, and the Huapango Dance Workshop (Houston, TX). She produced youth performances with Mono Blanco, Sones de México, Los Folkloristas, Zazhil, Ballet Folklórico de México de Amalia Hernández and Mariachi Guadalajara. She danced competitively in Concursos de Huapango (San Joaquín, Querétaro) and the International Folkloric Dance Competition (Chicago) where EBFE was awarded Second Place and the only U.S. group to place in the competition.

Always seeking cultural preservation and continuous improvement, Maestra Susana’s teaching focus for EBFE is to develop dancers and musicians as instructors with professional performance experience and academic knowledge in culture and literacy as well as to effectively empower all students with pride in themselves and respect for all ethnic groups.

Andrew Morton is an award-winning playwright and theatre-maker who creates socially engaged theatre with and for vulnerable populations. His plays have been featured or produced nationally at the Write Now Festival, the New England Theatre Conference, Flint Youth Theatre, and internationally at the Blue Elephant Theatre and the Hampstead Theatre in London. Andrew previously taught playwriting at the University of Michigan-Flint, and from 2017-2020 he served as the Region III Chair of the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival National Playwriting Program.

Andrew lives in Detroit, where he is a project manager for TimeSlips, an award-winning international nonprofit that promotes creative engagement techniques for people living with dementia. He also works as a teaching artist and facilitator with various organizations, including the Ennis Center for Children, the Detroit Phoenix Center, and University Musical Society.

Deidre D.S.SENSE Smith is a Detroit, MI native who has always shown great pride in her city. Her music, textured with layers of emotion and urban innovation, is a reflection of Detroit and the best it has to offer. The purpose of her music is to blend and mix all the eras and genres of music that have influenced her. By doing so, she hopes to introduce different styles and rhythms to intergenerational audiences everywhere.

As a Cultural Ambassador, Deidre D.S.SENSE Smith has performed on various stages both nationally and internationally, in support of equal rights, education, art, and the eradication of the many socio-political and economic woes plaguing our world. Smith has also developed S.Y.M.M.Y.S (Speak Your Mind, Mind Your Speech) and T.I.C. (The Inclusion Cypher) which are workshops with a curriculum rooted in the fundamentals and principles of Hip Hop. The goal of these workshops is to encourage community building, outreach, transforming conflict, and restorative justice through the Arts.

Susan Filipiak brings a life-long dedication to dance, focusing on American vernacular styles of tap, jazz, and swing dance. Years of music study (piano and voice) also gave her a strong understanding of the musicality of dance.

Susan studied extensively with the masters and mentors of American jazz & tap dance – Honi Coles, LaVaughn Robinson, Buster Brown, Frankie Manning, Gregory Hines, Brenda Bufalino, Dianne Walker, Heather Cornell. Susan has decades of teaching experience in dance studios, universities, K-12 arts enrichment programs, and was named a Michigan Traditional Artist by Michigan State University in 2014. She is delighted to work again with UMS, bringing dance into the classroom.

Events coming soon.

Events coming soon.

Supporters

Presenting Sponsor

Other Possible Funding Sources

We recommend exploring the following funding opportunities for field trips. Have a suggested addition to this list? Email us at umsyouth@umich.edu.

Arts and Culture Trek Grants (transportation)
MCACA Arts in Education Residency Program
Ann Arbor Awesome Foundation
Field Trip Grants from Target
The Meemic Foundation

Public School Foundations

Ann Arbor | Birmingham | Canton | Chelsea | Dearborn | Detroit | Dexter | Farmington/Farmington Hills | Monroe | Plymouth | Saline | Troy

Rachel Bomphray, 2020 DTE Energy Foundation Educator of the Year

Rachel Bomphray has worked over the past four years to grow a poetry program at Thurston High School. She organized opportunities for her students to collaborate on poetry and creative writing with University of Michigan students through the International Poetry Guild and has arranged trips for students to come to the university campus to have collaborative creative writing sessions with university students.

In 2018, she organized a field trip for her students to attend the performance of Wang Ramirez’s Borderline. Students used this live dance performance as a springboard for writing new creative compositions. She created guiding questions and prompts to instruct students to critically view this dance performance. In addition, handled all of the logistics to organize 33 students to participate in this extracurricular activity.

After viewing the performance, Rachel’s students collaborated with the university students in co-creating creative writing responses based on the performance and shared new work in an online format that is read worldwide.

Rachel continues to spur the interest of her students in the creative arts. This interest in the arts becomes the “hook” to do well in school, to visit the U of M campus, and to imagine oneself as a college student. Rachel’s work at Thurston has many facets. As an English teacher, she is tasked with making sure her students learn writing skills that are important to their academic development, but she is also concerned with developing the whole person, adults who have knowledge as well as an appreciation for the arts. Rachel’s use of all of these resources helps her students have a wider view of the world, themselves, and their place in it.

In response to the pandemic, Rachel has been exploring new ways to engage her students with the arts. Currently, she is collaborating with Eli Zemper (U of M Faculty) and Odyssey Works on a new initiative titled the incubator project which will begin in January 2021.

Learning Guides

UMS Learning Guides help teachers extend the impact of our School Day Performances beyond the walls of the theater into the classroom. By providing educator-specific information about the performance, artist, genre, as well as resources and lesson plans, UMS strives to make meaningful connections between the performance and curriculum. The content and design of the guides are informed by the State of Michigan Education Standards and by our UMS K-12 Education Manager.