An interactive “media studio on wheels” from the John F. Kennedy Center for Performing Arts has pulled onto the campus of Normal Park Upper School to give students a chance to become storytellers and filmmakers.
Normal Park Upper School was one of 10 schools selected across the country for On Location: Spotlight on Your Community, a two-week program designed to help students tell the story of arts in their community. On weekday afternoons from April 6 - 17, a group of 15 Normal Park students will work with a drama artist and media artists to produce a video documentary that will be shared around the world on the Internet.
The subject of the video documentary will be local stained-glass artist Dee Mays Lewis, who is working with several classes of Normal Park students to create a stained-glass piece for the school entrance as part of an artist-in-residency. The residency is funded by Allied Arts of Greater Chattanooga and the Benwood Foundation.
“We are thrilled that the Kennedy Center and our local community partners have come together to give the Normal Park Upper School students such an amazing learning experience,” says Jill Levine, Principal of Normal Park Museum Magnet. “Our students will have invaluable hands-on experiences working with glass and learning the art of filmmaking.”
During the two-week stay, students and teachers will be trained in storytelling, filmmaking, editing and producing video stories. The Kennedy Center will also be presenting Normal Park Upper School with a permanent media lab consisting of a computer, digital editing software, cameras, sound recording equipment, and accessories valued at approximately $5,000.
Normal Park Upper School is located at 1219 West Mississippi Ave. in North Chattanooga. The school serves grades 5 through 8 and was recently named a national Magnet School of Excellence by Magnet Schools of America. For more information on the school, visit www.normalpark.com.
For more information on the On Location project, visit www.onlocationproject.org. For information on the Kennedy Center, visit www.kennedy-center.org.