Student Voices
Former Cleveland student, Young Shakespeare Workshop receive prestigious award from first lady
Former Cleveland High School student Danisha Harris and the Young Shakespeare Workshop received a 2011 National Youth Arts and Humanities Program Award last week from first lady Michelle Obama.
During her first year at Cleveland, Harris joined Young Shakespeare Workshop, a longtime parterner of Seattle Public Schools, to work on an after-school production of Hamlet.
“As a freshman entering high school, I had nowhere to belong. In my previous years in school, I glided through my classes, sitting in the back and never stepping outside of my comfort zone" Harris said.
After joining the workshop in her second semester of 9th grade, Harris sought a role in the stage crew, but instead ended up in the cast, crew, and everywhere else. "The Young Shakespeare Workshop inspires me to lead, to follow through, and to achieve, even when I feel like shrinking into the background,” she said.
Harris made many two-hour bus trips from Kent to participate in the workshop’s summer first-year program. Harris hopes to attend either NYU film school or Maryland Institute of Communications and Art, where she already spends much of her time.
For 20 years, Young Shakespeare Workshop has gathered students for its tuition-free summer program from every high school at Seattle Public Schools. The workshop has brought after-school and in-class performance projects to Chief Sealth High School almost yearly since 1998 and has launched a number of workshop student productions. A student production of "A Midsummer Night’s Dream" will be presented in mid December at Cleveland High.
Franklin High School librarian Suz Babayan said, “This award is meaningful in so many ways but perhaps most important is the honor it bestows upon all the high school students who have given a summer, or two, or many to this very special program. It is life changing.”
Photo above, from left: Young Shakespeare Workshop ArtisticDirector Darren Lay and former Cleveland High School student Danisha Harris stand in the East Room of the White House Nov. 2 to accept the 2011 National Arts and Humanities Youth Program Award" from first lady Michelle Obama.