Interview with Alva Ibarra, board member, education partner, principal of Kelly Elementary School, and Steve Bailey, artistic director, company member

By Keith Hennessy

Keith Hennessy: Which school am I at?

Alva Ibarra: Kelly.

KH: Kelly Elementary School, and I am speaking with the principal Alva Ibarra. So, I would just love to hear in your words what Jump-Start do here and what’s the collaboration you have going together?

AI: Jump-Start over here with Kelly, actually it goes back to when I was at Bonham, when Steve came to us back then, and I believe it was ’94, ’92. We got the children involved in their culture, bringing in their parents. And so, when I left there I came here with that taste in my mouth that I wanted to definitely to bring that program here if I ever had the opportunity. And every time I saw Steve I reminded him of that. So I think they remembered and they finally came and approached me and I said, "Yes, what do you mean," and here we are. And I think we are doing the same kind of good things here.

I like the way that the artists take their time and they are very patient with the kids. Our children didn’t have any arts here with the exception of Carolina Flores that was here with the Artists in Residence program. And that was intermittent, one year we had an artist the next year we didn’t. And I wanted something consistent, something we could always count on. Hence the Jump-Start program here at Kelly. They meet with the teachers first of all and they talk with them and get their ideas of what we think we would like to see. A lot of what the teachers have expressed is that they want the children to have exposure to the arts, and expand their experiences. And I think that is important because our kids don’t have those experiences outside. At least, I’m speaking for myself, but when I was growing up, my parents took us here and there and we had all kinds of experiences. These children don’t have those opportunities, at least a lot of them don’t. So, I believe the art program has given them more experiences, so they can relate and do the other areas of their studies. So, they get them involved in projects. I know that we talked about doing a tile project.

Last year, the first year that Jump-Start came to our school it was a display; all the students did a self-portrait. It was wonderful. We had parental involvement. I hadn’t seen this many parents in quite awhile. And I mean I had a lot of parents here looking at their children’s art and they really, really enjoyed it. That’s something when you get the parents in here, and they want to see what their child did. A lot of them would say, "Look that looks just like you," and a lot of those kids were just so proud. It instilled a lot of pride in them. The self-portraits was a very valuable piece.

KH: And how are you funding this? Do you partly research funds or is it coming from the school?

AI: We do part funding and then they do the other part. I definitely thought it was important enough to put some money aside. We don’t have very much money, so that shows you how important I thought this was. Our staff did. We get little money, we are a small school and it is based on enrollment numbers. So, hence we get not as much as other schools, but we thought it was that important to bring the arts to the kids and give them some exposure to different mediums.

KH: Have you done theatrical productions here?

AI: Not yet, but I am hoping that is something we will be doing farther down the road.

KH: In terms of the potential of the collaboration, what are the things that you see or look forward to?

AI: Right now, we are just beginning the Arts Resources where Steve is working with the teachers and how he can help them in their disciplines. Say in math or writing, in their curricular areas. I see a whole new world there opening up with the arts coming in and integrating into the curriculum. Maybe it is science, something in science, something in math, something more concrete. Last week, they did the city council. I thought it was great. These kids were wonderful. We had our little mayor, Kelly mayor. And they reenacted the way the city council runs their meetings. We even had some kids picking up erasers and talking on the phones while the meeting was going on. I really enjoyed that, I got a kick out of that part. They were doing a persuasive piece: why they should have a park, and other citizens were saying why they shouldn’t have a park. This fits perfectly into what we are doing. We hear this word TASS a lot. TASS is a standardized test that all students have to take for the minimum skills in Texas. This helped them. If some of the kids didn’t get persuasive, you know writing and the concept of being persuasive, this helped them to act it out; you are reaching the modes that perhaps some of them just can’t get it just by lecture. They acted it out and they knew. The kids get to talk and speak and we don’t have enough of those opportunities either.

Steve Bailey: It came from their studying city government. Their social studies unit.

AI: I get overwhelmed because I think of so many things that could come off of this.

KH: Permanent artists in schools, yeah, it starts to make a lot of sense.

AI: Yeah.

KH: One of the questions that I have, and it also stretches the bounds of my research a bit, do you ever teach in Spanish? I know a little bit about San Antonio, so I know it has a heavy Spanish-speaking population. More Mexican-Americans than non, but—

AI: In our district we have the bilingual schools and the nonbilingual schools.

KH: Are the bilingual schools immersion schools?

AI: Well, yeah. Some are. Some are dual language, but our school is nonbilingual. That means that the students that come here are English speakers. We do get a few that the parents will do denials on, which means that they don’t want them to go to a bilingual school, they would rather keep them here. ’Cause this is their community and they feel that they want to stay here. Which is fine, we do need to let the parents know the consequences of that, because everything is taught in English.

KH: And most everyone comes from this geography?

AI: Yeah. Most everyone comes from all the little planet streets, we call. This immediate area. We are bound by the tracks all the way around, and then the border on Couples Road over this way. So, we have a small community, but it’s a very close community.

SB: This is one of the smallest schools in the district.

KH: How many students?

AI: We have about 278 kids. There are a few that are smaller than us.

KH: That doesn’t sound that small.

SB: It’s small for San Antonio. Some have as many as 600 or 700.

KH: One of the things that I am researching, or just trying to accumulate a bunch of, is just other stories. So, if there are other stories, like this city council one, so if there are other stories or images of a different project–

AI: I want to say that what I would like to see also. When I was at Bonham, I really enjoyed working with the artists. Remember at the end of the year when we did the art show, all the parents were involved? They brought their arts and their crafts and the kids showed their work. It was a big thing. I would like to see that as a culmination activity toward the end of the school year and get the parents involved like that. Right now, I think that’s going to be a good vehicle for parental involvement in the school, the arts.

SB: Is that an issue for you, parental involvement?

AI: Lately, I’ve seen a drop in parent involvement. It’s funny, what I’ve noticed is when there is a new principal coming in you’ve got a lot of parents here all the time. Then once they know you, then everything drops off. For example we had a PTA meeting last week, we had probably ten people here. When I had that art, student self-portraits, I had a lot of parents coming in and out wanting to see it. Wanting to take part in what their children were doing. That gave us a good feeling. I would like to see more of that. More things that would bring the parents in and involve them. We did the Historias y Cuentas over there at Bonham. I would like to see that here too. I would like to bring parents in and do a long mural and let them tell their stories. All though we are called a nonbilingual school, it is a predominately Hispanic community. All the kids need to know about their culture. A lot of them, they don’t. I think the Historias y Cuentas would be a good vehicle for that.

KH: The self-portraits, they got a chance to do who they are, and where they come from?

SB: That was the basis. It was about self and community. It’s as basic as making sure the skin tone is right. Around here that is a big thing.

KH: That’s a big thing everywhere.

SB: The little brown kids want to make themselves really white. We really talk about where you are from and— I mean it is really quick because these workshops are fast.

AI: As I said, Steve just began with the Arts Resources. I am really looking forward to a lot of good things there.

KH: What makes Jump-Start special because they really are an ensemble project, a whole team of people that has a vision and they are working together on it?

AI: And I hate to be drawing back to Bonham, but that’s where it started and I got to see all the artists. I remember Trinidad Sanchez was involved at the time and a lot of artists came in to Bonham. I had the privilege of sitting in with them and talking and planning. I could see it then that it was a very dedicated group of artists, and different mediums. Different backgrounds. And they all were committed to the kids. I saw how important that was. How they met with the kids, worked with the kids closely, and it was just great. You have to see it. They had a very good relationship and they were very committed, spending a lot of time after school. I know it is more than a group of people that got together to do a project. They are committed. Plus I’m on the board. So, I get to see them now in a different light, in that way too. I just started this past year. Just knowing them, and knowing how much the kids mean to them. You can see it, that they care.

SB: One of the extraordinary things that I thought happened last month was you guys doing the training for us. You should talk about that, cause it came from within.

AI: Members of the board, several of us put together staff development with the artists to give them a little bit more about how to work with kids. Educators. I felt like we really bonded, and so did the two ladies that worked with me. We all took different parts and we presented the curricular part of it. Different planning, how to plan, and then how to work with difficult kids, and how to reach them.

SB: This came from our retreat where we said here’s our problems, here’s our needs.

AI: It was a needs assessment.

SB: And the three educators on the board then got together and said, "We can help you do this". They did a little training for us. It was really cool.

AI: And it was in-house. And I did team building. I did some exercises that I do with my teachers just for team building. I think it was very important to share about some strategies to work with some of the kids, some of the difficult kids, the hard to reach ones. And I think we all benefited because we all shared. I’m an educator, but the other educators shared some things that were like, hey, I could use that too. We all came away with something.

KH: I also like the idea about involving the board in something that is a little less standard way to involve them. It’s not just what’s our future plan and how are we going to get the money to do it?

AI: Yeah, and you know we ended up talking about, we could do this again. We could assess all this and figure out what the next steps are and what it is we could do. We can do that again, come back and add more. The artists seemed to be receptive with it. They enjoyed it and I think we all came away with something valuable. Again, it’s not something I was given a whole lot of questions to ask about, but the whole idea of Jump-Start being able to collaborate— Again one of the communities they are involving themselves in, one is an actual institutionalized education community. How do they not just drop in there and do things? How do they actually have their lives changed by growing and learning more about these people? I think that is another thing Steve was telling me just before we came in is that there is an emphasis for them on doing long-term residencies with schools. So, they end up working with kids over a period of years, they end up working with the same teachers and principals. If it is the same artists from Jump-Start who are there, then there is this way in which people’s lives are changed. In a real way. Everything goes out from there.

They are part of our family now here at Kelly. The kids see them and they know them. We want that. We want them to be able to just come in here. They are part of our staff. Everybody accepts them and we are just happy to have them here. I envision a lot of things with this program. We have some land in the back and I would like to see maybe some Eagle Scouts, or maybe some of us, to make a little outdoor amphitheater and do a lot of plays. Developing oral skills, get them all out there and do things. I’ve thought of this for a long time.

SB: Hadn’t heard that, oh good, well, I’m glad you are talking about this.

AI: With all that field out there in the back, I thought, we could do something with this. Build little benches, build them into the ground. Let the other kids come out and watch them perform. Then they can do all kinds of plays, like Shakespeare. Why can’t they start down here? I know that a lot of that stuff happens at the middle school and high school, but why not at the elementary? Get them familiar with a lot of that now. I have some ideas. Some visions. Eventually I’m going to get with these guys and we are going to talk about—

KH: They have full access to this, that’s the point. I mean, even these transcripts will all get typed out and be open for everyone to see.

AI: Oh yeah, but they have full access to my school. That too

KH: I think if anything interesting comes out of this project it will all end up on the same Web site, and it will all end up in the same archive in the library. You’ll be able to see really clearly what people do, as opposed to a story we might share seeing each other once every three years.

AI: The teachers are getting used to seeing Steve more. Some of them are starting to get a little more warmed up. They are a little timid at times. Steve will find a way to get to them, too.

SB: They’re not timid anymore. It only took a few weeks. One thing I want to interject is just this thing about long-term. I think what I am just discovering through her conversation is that the long term makes it so that you aren’t so pressured to finish that project right now. The great thing about the amphitheater or other things like that is that we plan on being here as long as we can and therefore we don’t have to build the amphitheater tomorrow. A lot of times, you come in with drop-in projects and you are panicked to get that product done right away.

AI: I definitely see it as long-term.

KH: When they were first coming in here, what roadblocks did you run into? Some that you may have already solved, some that you are still working on.

AI: Like I said, at Bonham I think it was trying to get the teachers to open up a little to this. At first they were like, well, what’s this all about or how is this going to fit into my teaching? Where do they fit in? How’s it going to impact me, you know in terms of their time? Where is it going to fit into the day, and all of that. When I got over here I was already talking about Jump-Start before they came and talked to me. I was preparing the teachers, saying there’s this group and I going to do everything I can to get them over here because we sorely lack the arts here. The kids need this. So, they had been hearing about them for awhile, and finally I came to them and said, "Guess what? We are going to have Jump-Start." I could tell that they were thrilled about that, too. They weren’t sure exactly what to expect, but they were prepared. Whereas over there they weren’t. It happened one day and we worked from there. I didn’t see very many obstacles at Bonham except for the teachers trying to figure out, try to protect their turf, try to protect their time. I think that was one of the big ones. Does this mean I’m going to stay after school? What does this mean? Taking away from the instructional time, the impact that was going to happen on them in terms of time in general. So, I think that’s always probably the biggest obstacle. Also now, with the TASS testing being so heavily emphasized and all the pressures that were put on with it, teachers get real worried. We don’t have time to do those because we’ve got to do this with TASS. And then the funding, trying to find the money to do it. You know, we’ve decided that we are going to put some money aside for that because it is important to us. And those are the two major things. We’ve got a fine-arts room. At first the space used to be a concern, last year for me. We didn’t have any rooms and I wanted to give them a place. This year with the addition we had a fine-arts room, so that took care of that. They’ve got a big room that they can do things in.

SB: I’m curious about...I’ve always been curious about how you felt about that trip to North Carolina [what event was this]? What that was for you? It was early on in the program, I think it was like our first or second year at Bonham, and we said "Would you want to go with us?" And she came along. What did you learn from it? What did it feel like to you? What was your memory of it, I wonder?

AI: My memory of it was of very open-minded people. Everybody was very open- minded. I think they were above me at that time. I was just like, hey, what’s going on? I’ll just try to figure things out. I really enjoyed it. I enjoyed sitting there and listening to them talk. I enjoyed just being there with all the artists. They were just so cool. Everybody was nice, everybody was friendly.

KH: Did any other educators come?

AI: Not that I know of. Maybe a few, but not like me. I didn’t know any other educators there.

SB: Not like an administrator from a public school. There were some other educators there, but different. There was a principal from an arts school.

AI: I remember all these cultures coming together. All these cultures. I hadn’t been exposed to that, to so many different cultures all together. It was just a big eye opener. I enjoyed it. It was interesting.

KH: Are you from San Antonio?

AI: Yes. I am from San Antonio and the last time I saw anything like that was when I was in New York and I saw all these people running around from different cultures. Over there, it was just interesting. I enjoyed going to the different workshops, and I met a lot of nice people. It was a very good experience for me. I wish I could do it again. That was the first time, and so you don’t understand sometimes what’s going on. I think I would have a better sense now.

SB: I think now you would be a really useful resource to the group of people who were meeting, because they are constantly trying to figure out how to do work that is really strong grassroots work and bringing arts into community. One of the places that everybody wants to work to get access to the youth is in the elementary schools, in the middle schools. There are very few people from your side who have taken the time to figure out what’s possible here.

AI: I have a personal thing, I’ve always liked the arts, I write a lot. I love to write. I’ve always written. I’ve kept a journal since I was a kid. I have a journal since probably when I was in the fourth grade. And I have it all the way to now. All this time. I’ve always loved to write, and I’ve always felt the arts were very, very important.

KH: Is there any kind of time that you all set aside to evaluate or critique? I know that you are on the board, and that’s different. Just in terms of how Jump-Start is in the school, do you have an end of the year, or end of the month, or do you have any kind of time when you feedback? Or is that just an ongoing thing?

AI: I think it’s really ongoing. I talk with Steve and Annele every time they get over here. So, I think it’s just ongoing.

SB: Do you have a little committee that meets together ever?

AI: Yeah. In fact we just got some pictures developed from our meeting. We did some planning, our little steering committee from the campus. So, we talk there, too. We do it ongoing, and we do set up meeting times and we talk about what we would like to see.

KH: What is the frequency of these meetings?

AI: Probably about every nine weeks, just like our students. We do student assessments every nine weeks. We try and keep it like that. Then we talk and we sit and we share.

KH: Structurally, Jump-Start does a huge evaluation in the summer for the whole year?

SB: Right. And the education program is a big part of that assessment internally. One thing I want to interject, one thing that we’ve discovered that is vital when we come into public schools is to have a sympathetic administrator. We have found that the program could deteriorate pretty quickly if we don’t have an administrator like Alva, or others at our sites, that are really supportive. They don’t have to be the principal. But we are lucky here.

AI: You’ve got to have a key person somewhere.

SB: We’ve got to have a key administrator that really supports the program, and it’s not just about the teachers. There is hierarchy in the schools that we have to acknowledge.

KH: I know what it’s like to be supported by a teacher, but then not by a principal. And then the teacher can only go a certain distance, because then they will in a sense be in a hard way with the principal when you are not there. Like they can’t risk everything else they do for the one art project.

SB: It could even be a counselor, or a community liaison person, or an assistant principal. It doesn’t have to be the principal. Just someone who has entry into the workings of the school in a broader sense.

KH: How do you pick the kids that get to work with you?

AI: They are teacher-recommended. They select them based on the kids we think would benefit from the program. I have to say, though, a lot of kids want to be in the program. We’ve got a lot of kids just waiting and dying to get in there, but we have the teachers recommend the students. This is the after-school program.

SB: ’Cause that’s very limited.

KH: How many kids are in it?

AI: Right now about 15. We tried to go up to 22, but for one reason or another there was maybe one or two or three dropped out or moved away. We had a few that moved. So, we have about 15 right now.

SB: Which is a shame.

KH: Would it make sense to start a second?

AI: We would like to. I would like to offer it to more children.. I know at Bonham they did a classroom, and we did that here too.

SB: And we are going to this year, we just haven’t yet.

AI: So, we’re going to hit all the kids in some way.

SB: We get all the children at some point during the year. But it is very limited.

AI: The arts should just be part of the whole curriculum. We’re always saying that we are going to address the whole child, but you aren’t doing that if you aren’t teaching the arts. The arts is not just something extra, it should be part of what you are doing. And there is a rightful place for them in the curriculum. It’s just a natural... Back in kindergarten that’s all they do. They do a lot of art to get the concepts across to the kids. Well, why did we stop at a certain grade and not continue this? It should just be a continuum.

SB: In San Antonio, the public schools just have a part-time music teacher. Students get 30-40 minutes of music time once a week. That is it, I mean in terms of formal arts. A lot of teachers do incredible art work in their own classrooms. But as far as formal art training that’s all San Antonio gets.

KH: I’ve worked in a lot of school systems, and it’s all about money. I’ve worked in the suburbs. I’m from San Francisco. If you work in the city, it’s bare bones, but if you can get into the suburbs you start getting two or three art teachers. I worked in a public high school: Not only is there a huge theater that the drama club could have access to all the time, but there was a huge greenroom that was just run by students, with old couches that they could fully decorate and paint, and there was a rehearsal room. Can you imagine? And a huge program that kids pay into. The whole theater thing was built into the fabric of the whole school. Everyone knew about it.

AI: I hate to say this, but even the music program, I’m not thrilled with it. That music program is just so boring. I go there and I don’t like it. Don’t let my music teacher hear this. They don’t give them creative movement, they don’t do some things.

SB: It’s hard because they have to pull them in every 30 or 40 minutes, it’s like a new group. It’s hard.

AI: But you can do it. I used to teach P.E. and I used to teach creative movement with my kids in 45 minutes or less. I got some stuff in there, but they come in and do this rigid program. Some of the kids get bored. You can walk in there and see that they are bored. They are all sitting. I wish I could just get that money and channel it over here and do something better. That’s what I would do.

KH: Is there anything more that you would want to say about Jump-Start?

AI: I just feel that they are a very valuable piece of our school program. We’ve already planned out what we are going to do for this year in terms of murals that the kids are going to be involved in and some tile projects I believe. We are really looking forward to that. I just feel that they are a very valuable part of our campus, a very important part of our curriculum. I really can’t picture us without them. It’s like maiming your curricular program. They are very important to us. I wish all schools had the Jump-Start program. They don’t know what they are missing. People that don’t value the arts, they’re not addressing the total child. And we are here to address the total child. We can do that with them. They are going to help us get there. They are going to help us get these kids to become more creative thinkers. That’s a whole new world that we are going to tap into with our students, and so I think it is very valuable.

Keith Hennessy is a Canadian-born, interdisciplinary artist choreographer and community arts organizer living in community in San Francisco. Hennessy's solo work has been produced throughout the U.S., in Canada, New Zealand and Australia, including several gay and lesbian performance festivals. Since 1998, he has performed with Cahin-Caha, cirque bâtard, a French/American, mongrel circus based in France. Hennessy was a member of the performance collective Core and was a founding member and principle collaborator in Contraband, a San Francisco-based performance company. Hennessy co-directs 848 Community Space. He is a member of Alternate ROOTS, a service organization for community-based artists, and serves radical cultural agendas as a consultant, director, teacher, curator and agitator.

PERFORMING COMMUNITIES
Carpetbag | Cornerstone | Dell'Arte | Jump-Start
LAPD | Pregones | Roadside | WagonBurner
Commentaries