Verdigris Ensemble’s Student Leadership Cohort takes students from the concert hall to the board room.
Established last fall, the new educational initiative was developed to help students understand opportunities in the arts industry by exploring entrepreneurship, artistry, and business infrastructure. Micaela Bottari, Verdigris Ensemble’s Education and Development Manager, created the program to help fill in the gaps she noticed in her own education.
“I left college, I have a classical music degree and I essentially could get work as a choral singer anywhere, but I had very little knowledge about how to start my own artistic project, start a band, start an organization, anything along those lines,” Bottari said.
The program consists of 15 students ages 14-18 and acts as an extension of Verdigris Ensemble’s initial educational programs at W.E. Greiner Exploratory Arts Academy. Many of the students attend Yvonne A. Ewell Townview Magnet Center and are applying for college.
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“It’s a pivotal time in deciding how you’re going to move forward in your life,” Bottari said. “This program is, in my mind, an opportunity to not only help them pose questions about what they want out of their artistic careers and also give them the tools to realize if they don’t follow that path into an institution, into a college program, they still have those skills."
The students’ artistic interests range from modeling to music. Angela Gomez is a senior at Townview High School who plans to study sustainable architecture in college. She is the president of her high school choir and has a wide interest in the arts. The Student Leadership Cohort intrigued her.
The Scene
“I wanted to explore different forms that I love to do, like write,” Gomez said. “I wanted to be surrounded by other people who had different forms of expressing art. I joined and I was not disappointed. We have a lot of talented people in our group.”
The program gives the students an inside look at the choral ensemble’s organizational structure with staff and board members acting as mentors. Verdigris Ensemble also hosts workshops with professional artists explaining their career path.
“It’s important to share those stories so that the students have an opportunity to link goals with people,” Bottari said.
Guest artists include Big Thought’s Sergio Garcia, NYC hip-hop collective Space Cade7s, former SAG-AFTRA lawyer Kat Krone and City of Dallas Office of Arts and Culture Councilwoman Vicki Meek.
“It’s a very colorful community. It’s so fun to see where everyone’s adventure takes them,” Gomez said.
As a young artist working within the professional nonprofit arts world, Bottari realized a lot of artists do not know how a nonprofit organization works, how one is established, or how a nonprofit board functions.
“It seems crazy to me that we don’t teach anybody how that structure works,” Bottari said.
The choral ensemble invited four cohort students, a President, a Vice President, a Secretary, and a Treasurer, to sit on its board and actively participate in the decision-making process.
“All of those questions, I think, are more easily answered when you’re in the room experiencing it,” Bottari said.
Bottari asked interested students to prepare a two-minute pitch about why they wanted to serve on the board. Gomez started preparing her pitch.
“I wanted to get the experience of handling different components of a board,” Gomez said.
Gomez practiced her speech in her car, hoping to refine her public speaking skills. It did not go as planned.
“But when the time came down to it, I forgot everything I rehearsed,” Gomez said.
Gomez improvised, explaining what the Student Leadership Cohort means to her, her desire to collaborate and her interest in learning about budgets and compromise on a professional board. She was selected as President.
“I wanted people to know I was here for this, not just for the title,” Gomez said.
Having developed their skillset, the Student Leadership Cohort is creating an artistic project utilizing their diverse talents.
“The way they approached the storytelling element is really inspiring because they have repeatedly put the question of ‘Am I the right person to tell this story?’ at the forefront of their work,” Bottari said. “What I really love about working with them is they come to everything with so much thoughtfulness and care. They are incredibly intuitive with each other.”
The collaborative nature of the project is effortless for this group of teenagers.
“The people in there are the greatest people I’ve ever met,” Gomez said. “It’s really about teamwork and I think that encapsulates SLC [Student Leadership Cohort] to me.”
No matter what career path she chooses, Gomez will use the skills she learned through the Student Leadership Cohort to act boldly and make her dreams come true.
“I would say an important skill is never be afraid to reach out to anyone or everyone. You never know what connections there might be,” Gomez said.
Learn more: https://www.verdigrismusic.org/
