Nuvana brings social technology and arts education together to inspire youth
Artists have long enjoyed the creative space at the intersection of social networking and technology, using the Internet to generate new forms of art and more engaging platforms to experience art. While
Nuvana brings social technology and arts education together to inspire youth
Artists have long enjoyed the creative space at the intersection of social networking and technology, using the Internet to generate new forms of art and more engaging platforms to experience art. While funding has increased for these kinds of projects in the professional art world, school programs for art and music have been slashed, leaving youth without an outlet for their creative energies and creating lopsided access to this new art-tech resource in society.
An organization called Nuvana is trying to remedy this. Nuvana is re-inserting art into the curriculum in schools in New York City and San Francisco with a pilot program called Jamboree for Arts & Music that fuses social networking, technology, art, and youth education.
Over five weeks, students were invited to participate in an online game where they chose and executed “missions” that ranged from creating a mental map of a character’s journey through a story to making a video of a self-directed street performance. The goal was not to keep kids glued to screens, but rather to harness the power of social technology to encourage youth to become more engaged with their communities and more connected to their creative powers.
Recently, Nuvana hosted a “JAMLAB” event in Manhattan which brought local high-school students in their pilot program to a professional artists’ studio, where they met with top-notch artists and musicians for a day of instruction and mentoring.
Dowser: How did you introduce the Jamboree for Arts and Music platform into schools’ curriculum?
Lily Kwong, East Coast Managing Director: Our goal was to use technology to push kids into their own communities. And we wanted to show the country what a sustainable art intervention looks like. First we linked up with the New School’s Institute for Urban Education. They have six high schools that they work with in all different boroughs. The pilot program was brought to 250 kids, who completed 1,400 missions over five weeks. We asked teachers to sign up their students on the website during class or to have them do it after school. Some teachers made it mandatory and integrated it into their curriculum. We also worked with one school, the High School of Art and Design, that does a