Teaching Artist Program
Inspired by the Venezuelan El Sistema model, Yakima Music en Acción (YAMA) grows confident leaders throughout the neighborhoods it serves by widening access to professional-level music learning, igniting collective pride, and empowering and unifying students and families through music. Established in 2013 at Garfield Elementary School in Yakima, YAMA started as a community partnership of OIC of Washington, the Yakima School District and the Yakima Symphony Orchestra (YSO), with each organization providing critical support and services toward the YAMA mission. As of the summer of 2017, after two years as an affiliate program within the YSO organization, the core YAMA program is now managed through its own independent non-profit entity, employing its own administrative staff and Teaching Artists, once again in a three-way partnership with YSO and the Yakima School District.
Since 2014, YSO has separately hired Teaching Artists for the YAMA program from our symphony roster, ensuring that highly trained performing artists with professional symphonic credentials and experience play a consistent role as teachers and mentors on the YAMA faculty. YSO Teaching Artists champion and organize collaborative opportunities between YAMA and the YSO, particularly with an eye toward leveraging the artistic and social capital of the Symphony to inspire young musicians and bolster their success as citizen-artists. YSO Teaching Artists work closely with Site Directors, with YAMA Co-Founder and Executive Director Stephanie Hsu, and with a strong team of creative staff to develop student leadership skills, train students to teach and mentor younger students, advance their musical proficiency, support their social and emotional growth, and energize them about possibilities for their futures while connecting and supporting them to pursue post-secondary educational opportunities essential for their growth as lifelong learners. Visit the YAMA Website! Yakima Music en Acción (YAMA)
For information on how to support the YSO’s Teaching Artist program, call our office at (509) 248-1414.
The Yakima Symphony Orchestra’s Teaching Artist program is supported in part by sponsorship from Rosemary A.C. Gottlieb, Janet White and Gilbert Orchards, and by grants from the Yakima Valley Community Foundation and from the Washington State Arts Commission in collaboration with the Washington State Department of Commerce.