NEW YORK – Dallas Independent School District’s Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Arts has another distinguished alumnus making strides in New York City. Amber Pickens, now a second year student in the Bachelor of Fine Arts Dance Program at The Juilliard School in New York, has been selected to represent her school as a dance teacher for the school’s Annual ArtPowers Summer Arts Education Program. As a teacher for the program, Ms. Pickens will travel to Arusha, Tanzania to share the experience of dance with children and youth over a 4-week period.
Believing in the power of change through the arts, Ms. Pickens knows that arts education encourages creative thinking while developing necessary skills for independent and collaborative work. She will conduct dance workshops at the Meru View School, Saint Dymphna School, Umoja Youth Empowerment Center and International School Moshi. These one-week arts camps will serve as part of each school’s curricula as the major arts project for the school year.
Participants in the program are responsible for their cost of expenditures and fees that includes travel, lodging, health immunizations and medications, Tanzanian Visas, ground transportation, dance supplies for the workshops and others. In working towards meeting a goal of $7500, Ms. Pickens has joined forces with one of her mentors, Tony Award-winning director and choreographer George Faison to produce a benefit concert, NGOMA ARUSHA…A Journey in Dance. (Ngoma being the Swahili translation for “dance”) The concert will feature performances in dance, drama and music by students attending The Ailey School, The Juilliard School, The New School, New York University Tisch School and others with a special guest performance by acclaimed choreographer, dancer and Juilliard alumnus Abdur-Rahim Jackson. There will also be a silent auction.
The benefit concert, NGOMA ARUSHA…A Journey in Dance will be held on Saturday, March 23 at 7 p.m. at the Faison Firehouse Theatre in New York. Tickets are $40 for limited premium seating and $20 for general admission. Individuals can purchase tickets or make a donations online at www.SmartTix.com or by calling SmartTix at 212-868-4444.
