May the arts be with you!

Local arts education continues during shelter in place

Windsor Arts Now and the Windsor Unified School District have been advocating for the arts as an essential part of community resilience and recovery. Our primary goal has been to connect with stakeholders to share ideas and seek entry points for collaboration.
Here are some highlights:

• Visual and Performing Arts (VAPA) teachers are connecting with students through Google Classroom, Zoom and social media.
• The Windsor High School 9-10 Arts, Media and Entertainment core and Nueva School of the Arts programs have engaged students through the interdisciplinary Quarantine Project. The project has been extended throughout Sonoma County with partnerships with the Sonoma County Office of Education and St. Joseph Health.
• Windsor Arts Now is reaching out to local media to discuss how students and families are using the arts to connect with each other and stay strong during the SIP order.
• Windsor Arts Now is collaborating with California Poets in the Schools, the Windsor Unified School District (WUSD), the Windsor Wellness Partnership, the Luther Burbank Center for the Arts and other community partners to seek funding for a multi-step project to offer social-emotional arts strategies to the schools, neighborhoods and the community. 
• WUSD’s VAPA Facilitator Elizabeth Robertson, was a featured speaker on a webinar hosted by CREATE/CA, “The Arts and Socio-Emotional Learning: Leveraging Arts Instruction as Essential in Recovery” on April 29. The webinar was attended by over 200+ arts professionals and supporters.
• Windsor Arts Now and WUSD are collaborating to create a virtual  elementary “Arts Day” in May. 
• Windsor Arts Now and WUSD are gathering examples of student artwork  to create a 2 to 3 minute video for the WUSD Boar of Trustees.
• Windsor Arts Now and WUSD are collaborating with Creative Sonoma, CREATE/CA and the California Alliance for Arts Education to continue the conversation and implementation of the arts as resilience and recovery strategies.

And of course, for your own sanity, wellness, fun and creativity, may the arts be with you each and every sheltering-in-place day.