Inner City Students Cap Summer Enrichment Program at the Orange County Performing Arts Center
SANTA ANA, Calif.-(Business Wire)-August 24, 2009 - Students at the Nicholas Academic Centers capped a summer of theater, music, dance and other cultural education classes by attending a performance of Fiddler on the Roof at the Orange County Performing Arts Center. The Henry T. Nicholas III Foundation, which funds the Centers, treated approximately 40 students to an evening performance followed by a question-and-answer session with cast members and informal dinner.
Throughout the school year, Nicholas Academic Center students from Santa Ana and Valley High Schools spend most their afternoons doing homework, studying for the SATs, and completing college applications. The free Summer Enrichment program was started as a supplementary course to the academic school-year portion to help make up for drastic cuts in summer school curriculum by partnering with organizations that are part of the Nicholas Foundation philanthropic network, such as the Performing Arts Center and the Ocean Institute in Dana Point. Students were introduced to various experiences oftentimes limited by their socio-economic backgrounds.
The program aimed to enhance the Nicholas Academic Centers’ curriculum, to help improve the students’ academic achievement and to encourage them to find new ways of expressing themselves through the arts. For many students, Fiddler on the Roof was only their second experience at a live theatrical performance—the first being a performance of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, at the Performing Arts Center earlier in the summer and also sponsored by the Henry T. Nicholas III Foundation.
“The Nicholas Academic Centers are dedicated to providing these high-potential students with a better overall educational experience, and that includes an extracurricular education filled with art, theater and hands-on experiences,” said Dr. Henry Nicholas, the Broadcom Corporation co-founder who has given $3.8 million to the Performing Arts Center and two years ago founded the Nicholas Academic Centers. “By forging a strategic partnership with the Orange County Performing Arts Center, the Ocean Institute and other organizations, we are enriching the cultural lives of disadvantaged, inner-city students.”
While the program officially concludes Aug. 21, students will take an additional trip Aug. 26 to MacArthur Park’s Mama’s Hot Tamales Café, an economic development project aimed at mentoring limited-income entrepreneurs who may not have access to the skills and resources they need to start a business. Mama’s Hot Tamales Café has been praised both locally and nationwide—and is fully supported by the city of Los Angeles—for providing the leadership that has helped the local community overcome decades of economic, residential, educational, environmental, and recreational disinvestment.
The Café’s program director, Sandi “Mama” Romero, will teach the students how to cook tamales while also explaining the program’s cultural and economic benefit to the surrounding community. The students will also visit Mama’s Small Business Kitchen Incubator in Pasadena, a licensed food preparation and education area for those starting a business. An economic development project of the Episcopal Housing Alliance, the Incubator and Café help stimulate the local economy by utilizing local resources.
Like the partnership between the Performing Arts Center and the Academic Center, the field trip to Mama’s Tamales Café and Small Business Incubator is designed to not only bring together two programs that the Henry T. Nicholas III Foundation fully supports, but to teach the students about successful entrepreneurs through the results of hard work.
The Nicholas Academic Centers’ school-year program will resume the first week of September.
About the Nicholas Academic Centers
The Nicholas Academic Centers are run by retired Superior Court Judge Jack Mandel and funded by the Henry T. Nicholas, III Foundation. Located in downtown Santa Ana and on the campus of Valley High in Santa Ana, the Centers provide free tutoring and mentoring for students, as well as computers and a safe and comfortable place to study.
About the Henry T. Nicholas, III Foundation
The Henry T. Nicholas, III Foundation was established in 2006 with the goal of improving communities and individual lives through investment in Education, Youth Sports, Technology, Science, Medical Research, Victim’s Rights and National Defense. The Foundation was created by Dr. Henry T. Nicholas, III, co-founder of Irvine, Calif.-based Broadcom Corporation. For more information on the Foundation visit www.htnfoundation.org.
About the Orange County Performing Arts Center
The Orange County Performing Arts Center presents a wide variety of the most significant national and international productions of music, dance and theater to the people of Southern California. It is committed to supporting artistic excellence on all of its stages and offering unsurpassed experiences, engaging the entire community in new and exciting ways through the unique power of live performance and an array of inspiring programs. For more information, visit OCPAC.org.
About the Episcopal Housing Alliance
The Episcopal Housing Alliance and Economic Development agency was created by the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles to meet the increasing need for affordable housing for limited-income residents and to teach self-sustaining job skills through small business incubators and job training cafes.
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