Community partnerships
Base Academy of Music
Clint Velazquez— Founder
Base Academy of Music (BAM) was officially formed in 2013 as a nonprofit organization in the state of Missouri. We believe music education is a vital part of a complete education and students who want to study music should be able to, regardless of the community they live in or their economic status. We know the lessons learned in music help develop us into competent, contributing members of our communities. The organization provides private and group lessons, in addition to after school programs and small ensembles to the students of the KCMO school district boundaries.
Superhero Yoga
Janis King started teaching yoga in the Fall of 2016, and was impressed with the health benefits she experienced and witnessed in her students. A former marketing executive and mother of three young children, she imagined bringing this powerful healing art into high-poverty schools where the impact of her work could be even greater.
When the executive director at Academy for Integrated Arts heard her idea, she urged Janis to begin a pilot program immediately at the school. With the help of AFIA librarian, Laurie Bomba, and one of Janis’ first yoga teachers, Isaac Collins, Superhero Yoga was born.
Kansas City native and business owner Isaac Collins had been looking for a way to give back to the Kansas City community by sharing his passion for mindfulness with young people. Isaac had begun a practice of transcendental meditation in 2012 to heal from a traumatic experience, and had extended his practice to teaching yoga in 2016. When Janis approached Isaac to join Superhero Yoga, he needed no convincing.
Superhero Yoga provided the first trauma-informed yoga class to the students at Academy for Integrated Arts in March of 2017. The need for trauma-informed yoga in Kansas City schools is great, and growing. Superhero Yoga has assembled and trained a team of qualified yoga instructors to address this need.
Kansas City Young Audiences
5601 Wyandotte St
Kansas City, MO 64113
(816)531-4022
“Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist when he grows up.” Pablo Picasso
Founded in 1961, KCYA’s original mission was to bring classical music programs to area school children. Since that time, KCYA has expanded to deliver programs in all arts disciplines including music, dance, theater, creative writing and visual arts through partnerships with professional Teaching Artists and Arts Partners. KCYA helps schools provide arts programs to their students as well as operates the Community School of the Arts which provides children the opportunity to further explore their own artistic and creative abilities beyond the regular school day. Serving more than 5 million in its history, KCYA is the largest provider of arts programs in the Kansas City area and one of the largest members of the national Young Audiences Arts for Learning network.
The Literacy Lab
4049 Pennsylvania Ave.
Kansas City, MO
816-945-2183
The Literacy Lab’s mission is to provide low-income children with individualized reading instruction to improve their literacy skills, leading to greater success in school and increased opportunities in life.
The Literacy Lab serves children from age three through grade three. We partner with school districts to help close the literacy gap largely by embedding full-time, rigorously-trained tutors in early childhood centers and elementary schools. The Literacy Lab also supports early literacy for families experiencing homelessness
Alvin Ailey Dance Foundation
1714 E 18th St.
Kansas City, MO 64108
(816) 471-6003
Alvin Ailey Dance Foundation’s mission is to further the pioneering vision of the choreographer, dancer, and cultural leader Alvin Ailey by building an extended cultural community which provides dance performances, training and education, and community programs for all people. This performing arts community plays a crucial social role, using the beauty and humanity of the AfricanAmerican heritage and other cultures to unite people of all races, ages and backgrounds.
Lead to Read
6022 N Strathbury Ave.
Kansas City, MO 64151
Lead to Read connects trusted, caring adult volunteers (called Readers) with kids in grades 1 through 4 from every walk of life. Once a week, for 30 minutes, Readers and kids explore the world by reading books provided by the children’s teachers, in the safety and security of an elementary school classroom.
Lead to Read works on a couple of levels:
❑ Behind the scenes, with teachers who choose reading material that coordinates with classroom needs.
❑ Upfront, with kids themselves, who thrive on the extra reading help and one-on-one attention.
It’s basic, really! Lead to Read’s goal is simple: To inspire kids to love to read — and to let them know that someone cares.
The Kansas City Teacher Residency
415 Delaware St #4E
Kansas City, MO 64105
(816) 298-5660
The Kansas City Teacher Residency will recruit, prepare, develop, place, and retain mission-oriented individuals who want to make a deep commitment to working in high need urban schools in the Kansas City area.
The Kansas City Teacher Residency strives to develop passionate individuals who want to join the teaching profession into effective, compassionate teachers who work hard every day to ensure kids receive the education they deserve. We do this through a residency model, which allows residents to develop and hone their teaching skills in a master-teachers classroom for an entire year, while also earning their certification, and through weekly instructional coach visits, seminar classes and content courses. These development structures help our residents teachers become the teachers the students of Kansas City both need, and deserve.