Hope, Ark. – Southwest Arkansas Arts Council (SWAAC) announces a night of comedy and music brought to you by the students in Beryl Henry Elementary’s drama project. For the past semester, the Arts Council has worked with the Hope Public Schools to begin a new drama project with the students at Beryl Henry Elementary. The project began as the inspiration of Chris Espinosa, a teaching artist from Texas. Espinosa, who instructs the Arts Council’s STAR Academy summer drama camp, envisioned a collaboration that would bring a strong drama program to the students in Hope. To accomplish that, he proposed a project that would introduce drama to the students while connecting literacy and language skills through script writing. Then, students would perform scripts they themselves were responsible for writing. 

At the time, the project remained a dream, for both Espinosa and SWAAC. That is, until early 2023 when SWAAC was awarded funding from the National Endowment for the Arts. The grant award would provide monies to bring Espinosa to Hope and begin an integrated drama/literacy program at Beryl Henry Elementary. In September, Espinosa along with Magnet Resource Teacher for Drama & Art, Regina Walker began working with students on character development, screen scripting and dialog writing. Grant funding allowed for extended visits from Espinosa to direct development of scripts and scene staging. The culmination of the grant project will be on Thursday, December 7, 2023, at 5:30pm when the drama students of Beryl Henry take center stage to perform for the first time. The community is invited and encouraged to attend the performance. 

SWAAC is pleased to join with the National Endowment for the Arts, Hope Public Schools, Beryl Henry Elementary, and Chris Espinosa to pave new ways for drama in our schools and community. Oscar Wilde expressed it perfectly, “theatre as the greatest of all art forms, the most immediate way in which a human being can share with another the sense of what it is to be a human being.”

For more information contact Jennifer Block, Executive Director, Southwest Arkansas Arts Council. 870-777-8200 or [email protected]. 

Website: www.swa-artscouncil.squarespace.com

Location: 200 Division Street Hope, AR 71801

The mission of the Southwest Arkansas Arts Council (SWAAC) is to enrich our community through experience, expression, education in all the arts.