Stafford Elementary School was one of three finalists for the first Washington State Imagination Award. New York City’s Lincoln Center Institute (LCI) and Washington state’s Creativity Matters Coalition partnered to create this new annual award to:
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Honor Washington public schools that make a difference in their communities by valuing and educating for imagination
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Highlight the importance of imagination in public schools.
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Demonstrate the connection between innovative educational practices and the development of imagination in students
In its inaugural year, the Washington State Imagination Award focused on public elementary schools. Nine schools from eight school districts applied for the award. The three finalists were Stafford Elementary School in Tacoma, Madrona K-8 School in Edmonds and Thornton Creek Elementary School in Seattle.
The winner of the first $5,000 Imagination award was Thornton Creek. The school also received two scholarships for the Lincoln Center National Educator Workshop, a teacher training program offered in the summer at LCI in New York. Stafford received a complimentary online training registration for a teacher, a copy of Maxine Green’s “Variations on a Blue Guitar” and a DVD of her lectures entitled, “Lending the Work Your Life,” for its professional development library.
The 2010 Imagination Award will focus on intermediate schools in Washington state.
The LCI has granted an Imagination Award to New York City public schools since 2006. The creation of the Washington State Imagination Award is a positive response to the center’s initiative to take the award beyond New York City. Scott Noppe-Brandon, executive director of LCI, said, “Washington state has a wealth of imaginative educators and schools, and it is the perfect partner to extend our mission nationwide.”
The Lincoln Center Institute for the Arts in Education, set up in 1975, is the educational cornerstone of the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts Inc. It is the leading organization in developing skills of observation, imagination and creativity guided through encounters with the visual and performing arts. Over the past 35 years, the Lincoln Center Institute has shared its unique method of education with more than 20 million students, teachers, college professors and arts administrators representing public schools, arts organizations and professional teaching colleges in New York City, across the nation and around the world. See the Web site at www.lcinstitute.org for more information.
The Washington Creativity Matters was established in 2007 when a group of education, civic, business and arts leaders gathered to hold a summit called Creativity Matters to discuss and demonstrate how vital it is to inject more imagination and creativity into public education and to foster a culture in schools that rewards imagination. Lynn Eisenhauer, arts and music facilitator for the Tacoma Public Schools, was a member of the Creativity Matters Steering Committee. The Creativity Matters summit grew from Governor Chris Gregoire’s Washington Learns commission. See the Creativity Matters Web site at www.creativitymatters.net for more information.
Check the Web site in the fall of 2009 for the 2010 Imagination Award application which will focus on public secondary schools. For reference, you can view or download the 2009 Washington Imagination award criteria and application form below.
If you have any questions, please e-mail info@creativitymatters.net.