Today, the Boston Globe ran a story about students at the Edison K-8 School, a City Connects school in Boston’s Brighton neighborhood, tackling Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” The story, “Arts are helping shape Edison K-8 School,” shows the commitment of the Edison community to providing exposure to arts and enrichment activities for their student population.
At City Connects, we believe it is just as important to nurture a student’s strengths as it is to address his or her needs or challenges. Our School Site Coordinators make many referrals to community agencies that offer enrichment opportunities to students so they can explore the arts, music, or theater–creative expressions they may not have been exposed to otherwise. In 2010-11, about 10% of the 33,700 services and enrichment opportunities delivered to students were arts-related.
Mary Driscoll, Principal of the Edison, said in the story that arts “do so many different things for us as a school community. Everyone gets involved.’’
For More Information:
- Watch a video of a dress rehearsal of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” performed by Edison students
City Connects Blog 
All students should be able to enjoy a theater trip with workshops and backstage tours. Here in the UK a trip to London or to Stratford-Upon-Avon is the highlght to many a drama or Englsih student’s year. But it is not just drama students who can benefit from Shakespeare – musicals like “Wicked” and “Billy Elliot” offer opportunities to approach issues such as “acceptance” and “being different” in a very accessible way.