Menlo Park-Atherton Education Foundation – 2020 Auction "It's For The Kids"
Auction Ends: Mar 16, 2020 09:00 PM PDT

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Fund A Need 2020: Visual & Performing Arts

Help fund the Visual & Performing Arts programs at Encinal, Laurel, Oak Knoll, and Hillview!

All four of our fabulous schools offer robust visual and performing arts learning opportunities for all students. In K-5, the students receive a minimum of 60 minutes a week of art and music instruction from dedicated, credentialed teaching staff. In middle school, the students have an opportunity to choose from many visual and performing art electives including art, drama, band, orchestra, jazz band, improv, and photography and claymation.  Additionally, there are school-wide visual and performing arts activities for students including fully staged Broadway musicals at every school, the yearly Spring art shows, Winter and Spring musical concerts, travel opportunities with Hillview music like Disney Music Days, performing at San Francisco City Hall, the Menlo Park Halloween Hoopla, and the Redwood City Holiday Parade.

Visual and Performing Arts opportunities directly support MPCSD’s mission to inspire high academic achievement, challenge students’ minds, and enrich their lives. Regular exposure to arts education improves school climate, increases students’ engagement with school and their peers, helps students feel more empathy and compassion towards others, and has been shown to significantly increase writing scores.

Your donation, at the level you feel comfortable, will support the district to provide additional support for the Visual & Performing Arts programs at our schools such as the examples listed below:  

$5,000 funds:  Professional development for all K-8 arts teachers including participating in specialty classes , funds for teachers to attend the National Art Education Association or the Musical Teachers National Association conference or bringing experts to our schools to train our teachers. Theater technical supplies to bring productions at Hillview’s PAC to life including speciality lighting, sound and visual projection systems and technology.

$3,500 funds:  Off-site field trip for one grade level of students to a Musical Performance or Visual Arts destination, including bus transportation.  Examples include: San Francisco Symphony, UC Berkeley’s Zellerbach Hall, SFMOMA, DeYoung Museum, and Precita Park Murals in the Mission District of San Francisco.

$2,500 funds:  Costumes, set design supplies and lighting for one Broadway-style musical performance such as last year’s Mary Poppins, the recent 3rd grade Lion King production at Oak Knoll, and the upcoming Seussical and Wizard of Oz productions.  

$1,000 funds:  Visual artist, singer, dance troop or musician in-person visit to one school site to present all students with a performance of their art.  Examples include Axis Dance Company, Hip Hop for Change, Jazz in the Schools and Young Audiences of Northern California.  

$750 funds:  Purchase of world music curriculum, instruments and supplies such as castanets, clapsticks, conga drums, text photos, crafts and games for one elementary school site - to teach students about the music, instruments, culture, people and geography of that country or part of the world.

$500 funds:  Visual and performing arts supplies for one school campus to be used for an outdoor art project or for teaching movement and dance.  Examples of supplies include acrylic paints, sponges, stencils, chalk pastels, wireless microphones, rhythm sticks, ribbon wands, and dancing scarves.

$250 funds:  Resource books for both teachers and students to enhance and deepen musical arts learning. Examples include class sets of duet and trio books for music instruction, class sets of band arrangement collection books, and picture books relating to musicians or musical concepts for the elementary music classrooms.

$100 funds:  Consumable art supplies for one grade level project at a school site. Examples: colored pencils, paints, construction paper, paint brushes, rolls of art butcher paper, metal tooling foil, and digital crayons for use on iPads.