Arts Educators Save the World

Sweet home Chicago! Join us for this love letter to arts education in Chicago with the amazing Professor-poet-comics-author-bookstore-owner Eve Ewing and her mentor, poet laureate and performance artist avery r. young. Arts education creates families!

Part 2 of our conversation with comedian, actor, and writer Billy Eichner continues, as we delve into how acting teacher Mary Poole’s approach to mentoring shaped all of our lives. Find Part I in your podcast feed!

It’s Billy on the podcast! This episode features comedian, actor, and writer Billy Eichner alongside guest co-host Jamie Salka (CEO of Story Pirates) as we talk with the college acting teacher we all shared: Mary Poole. You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, it’s better than Cats.

Part 4 of our ongoing mini-series "Erica & Alek Chats," where our hosts take a deep dive into a specific aspect of arts learning-and-teaching from Erica's book, How the Arts Can Save Education.

What does it take to be the Artistic Director of a major theatre company? And how do you recognize someone’s potential to succeed in this kind of a leadership role? You will not want to miss the answers to these and other questions about leadership in theatre in our conversation with two grandes dames of the American theatre world, Molly Smith and Wendy Goldberg!

Live! from the National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts it’s AESTW!!! Erica and Alek traveled to Salt Lake City for a live recording at the NCECA conference with VETART Executive Director Steve Dilley and ceramicist and navy veteran Reginald Green. Our audience was moved by Reggie’s story of transformation and identity-making through ceramics… and now you can bear witness!

Dropping in our feed today is an episode from our friends at Blue Sky. Bill Burke and the Optimism Institute host conversations about positivity, including this gem with Vanessa Cooksey about her optimistic take on the future of the arts, the vital role that artists play in our communities, the joys of arts education. Onward together!

On today’s episode we journey through the amazing arts education program Disney Musicals in Schools with Broadway star L. Steven Taylor (Mufasa in "The Lion King") and Dr. Lisa Mitchell (Director of Education, Disney Theatricals). This team of artists and educators works in elementary schools across the US to bring musical theatre joy to students everywhere!

Part 3 of our ongoing mini-series "Erica & Alek Chats," where our hosts take a deep dive into a specific aspect of arts learning-and-teaching from Erica's book, How the Arts Can Save Education.

In this episode, we're sharing a story from our friend Kyle Wood, host of the delightful podcast "Who ARTed?" Kyle is a National Board Certified Teacher with 17 years experience in public schools, and his show is meant to be accessible for anyone interested in art with a focus on fun facts that are appropriate for listeners of all ages, so it's totally safe to listen with your kids! Katsushika Hok...

Sometimes, the most compelling mentorship relationships are mutual – where the student has as much to give as the teacher. In this wide-ranging conversation, Warrington Hudlin, founder of the Black Filmmakers of America and Loren Hammonds, head of documentary for Time Studios, talk about the importance of community and showing up for one another, and their mutual love for virtual reality and immer...

Holy moly, it's a great day indeed when you get to talk with, not one, but two of the greatest living composers of musical theatre and opera!! On today’s episode, we talk with 2024 Tony Award-winner Shaina Taub and her mentor, Pulitzer Prize-winner Jeanine Tesori about critique, the importance of community, and, of course, mentorship. Even Alek was moved by our conversation, so you know we were on...

This week we're sharing an episode from our friends at The Story Pirates. In it, a magnetic, musical manatee (John Legend) tries to convince the Story Pirates to form a marching band, but is he really who he says he is? Featuring two new stories: “Butts,” a song about, well, butts, sung by Broadway star F. Michael Haynie and written by Malachy, a 7 year old from Pennsylvania, and “The Audition,” a...

On today’s episode, we explore the art of choreography with artist Parker Esse and his mentor, the legendary Baayork Lee. We ask "what do you do as an artist when words aren’t enough?" The answer? You dance!!!!

It's the second episode in our ongoing mini-series "Erica & Alek Chats," where our hosts take a deep dive into a specific aspect of arts learning-and-teaching from Erica's book, How the Arts Can Save Education.

This episode is for the thinkers! Join glass artist and PhD student in Materials Science Engineering Aaron Bossen and his mentor, Head of the UW-Madison Glass Lab and United States Artists (USA) Fellow Helen Lee as they talk about the art of making glass and making with glass. We dive into the world of conceptual art, and we talk about glass as both a material and a metaphor for life. Enjoy this i...

In this episode, we're sharing our pal Michael Goodfriend's conversation with Dorcas Leung, who plays "Juliet" in the Play On Podcasts production of "Romeo and Juliet." Michael and Dorcas are passionate artists and arts educators who talk about everything from representation in the theatre to the power of HS arts education. Find more Play On & Next Chapter podcasts at: https://www.nextchapterpodca...

This is the first episode in an ongoing mini-series we're calling "Erica & Alek Chats," where our hosts take a deep dive into a specific aspect of arts learning-and-teaching from Erica's book, How the Arts Can Save Education.

Broadway and TV's finest production stage manager Cody Renard Richard reflects with his HS theatre teacher Carrie Wood about their shared love of stage management, HS theatre, rodeo, and Cody's foundation: The Cody Renard Richard Scholarship Foundation, which supports young technical theatre artists of color. Read about Cody here: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/18/arts/culture-diary-cody-renard-r...

Multimedia artist, teaching artist, and all around badass Carlos Gacharna talks with his high school ceramics teacher Geof Hermann. They explore how the high school ceramics classroom is a life-saving space for both students and teachers. Follow Carlos on IG here: https://www.instagram.com/caduphoto/?hl=en

Broadway's reigning Tony-award winner for Best Actor, Jonathan Groff (Merrily We Roll Along, oh yeah, and Frozen, oh yeah, and Hamilton), and his elementary school music teacher, Linda Tough, talk about music-making, education, and their shared passion for "I Love Lucy."

Erica and Alek are back! And from now on, we're gonna be a semi-weekly podcast! New episodes start dropping Nov 14, with none other than Jonathan Groff! Follow the show on Twitter @artseducators, on IG @artseducatorspodcast, and learn more at www. ArtsEducatorsPodcast.com. Subscribe today to be inspired by how these educators and mentors changed the lives of the artists... that change our worlds.

So many first-time ingredients to spice up the episode we've whipped up this week: Our FIRST guest from the CULINARY arts... Our FIRST guest co-host who is also an artist in the art form o' the day... and our FIRST guest who has brought along his MOM! A melange of new flavors baked into this week's conversation with 2024 Top Chef-testant CHEF VALENTINE HOWELL, JR, and his mother, STEPHANIE JOACINE...

We launched this podcast in Season One with a conversation between Lin-Manuel Miranda, Robert Lopez, and Ms. Barbara Ames, who was not only their mentor (and elementary school music teacher), but Erica's as well. We now end Season Two with Bradley Whitford, whose mentor (and university theater professor) was, in fact, Alek's as well. Bradley Whitford is, of course, a three-time Emmy Award-winner a...

Our guests today, working at the highest levels of network television, are proof that the mentorship doesn't end at graduation. Craig Thomas is the co-creator of CBS's smash sitcom HOW I MET YOUR MOTHER, which received 30 Emmy Award nominations in its nine-season run. His prose has been published in The Iowa Review, The Boston Globe, The New Yorker, McSweeney’s, and the Weekly Humorist. He joins u...