The Monroe Street Journal

Issue date: 10/8/07 Section: Inside Ross

Club events encourage members to take part in cultural engagement, social entrepreneurship, and creative leadership. In a recent event, Arts Enterprise brought hip hop artist Toni Blackman to the Global Urban Symposium, sponsored by Net Impact. Ms. Blackman has performed around the world with artists such as Erykah Badu, Mos Def, The Roots, and Wu Tang Clan. She educates young people in rap and spoken word in order to improve their skills in public speaking, writing and team work. In her workshop titled "Hip Hop, Creativity and Social Justice," Ms. Blackman focused on improvisation, association and collaboration in exercises in spoken word and freestyle. Ms. Dylla said that the workshop remarkably quickened participants' willingness to communicate openly with one another. "There's something about having interaction in a different context-it was impressive how quickly it broke down barriers."

Arts Enterprise is sponsoring a series of workshops that will "allow students to explore means of freer expression". Upcoming workshops include "Business with Bill Shakespeare" by Julliard educator Eric Booth, "Executive Maestro" with an orchestra conductor, and "Whose Bottom-Line is it Anyway?" a workshop exploring improvised comedy with UofM's Theatre Program faculty. The club is also sponsoring a speaker series with leaders in different fields of the arts, as well as joining the Entertainment and Media Club in the NY Forum, a networking and learning trip to various organizations in NYC. In addition, Arts Enterprise is planning Go Blue! For New Orleans. A group of students will travel over spring break to New Orleans for a planning and implementation project to support the city's volunteer public education development. Finally, Arts Enterprise sponsors students through AEIdeas, providing mentorship, support and small grants to students launching arts and business-related program ideas in the school and community.

Arts Enterprise partners with UMS, bringing members to great arts performance events here in Ann Arbor, while their upcoming Global Coffeehouse will showcase talents as well as diversity of students across the University with performances and collaborations in a laid-back setting.

Continued...

< prev Page 2 of 3 next >

Article Tools