By Christopher Tiffany, University of Michigan

This summer, students at the Detroit School of Arts—a performing and fine arts public high school in Midtown Detroit—got a jumpstart on the school year. For two weeks in August, nearly 100 entering freshmen participated in the JumpstART Academy.

This summer’s JumpstART Academy student mentors

The JumpstART Academy is a joint project of the University of Michigan School of Education and the Detroit School of Arts (DSA). Funded in part by a grant from the Knight Foundation, the JumpstART Academy is an interdisciplinary summer program designed to help new students understand the culture and expectations of the DSA while exploring their identities as scholars and artists both in high school and beyond.

Now in its second year, the theme of this year’s JumpstART Academy was “What does it take to be an artist and a scholar?” Students and teachers used five key ideas to focus their work: dedication, balance, passion, creativity, and self-discipline.

JumpstART Academy student work

The JumpstART Academy engaged students in a wide variety of arts-centered learning activities, including interdisciplinary workshops that combined music and math; poetry, dance, and history; and visual arts, technology, and social studies. Students worked with teaching artists and their peers from other arts disciplines to explore the intersections between different art forms and different fields of study. Students also spent time engaged in intensive projects around each of their chosen majors (voice, orchestra, band, dance, visual arts, theater, music tech, and radio/television/broadcasting). The Academy culminated in a showcase performance for an audience of hundreds of friends and family members.

Programming for the JumpstART Academy was taught by DSA faculty members, community artists, and arts professionals from local organizations such as the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. Students also had the opportunity to take field trips to the Detroit Institute of Art and the Detroit Public Library where they participated in an architecture tour and created a sand art “quilt” with local artist Gail Rosenbloom Kaplan.

Co-Directors of this year’s program, Cecelia Sharpe and Miriam Braun, noted that one of the most successful aspects of the program was the utilization of student mentors. Ten rising juniors and seniors assisted staff and faculty in facilitating programming, field trips, and guest artists while working with the younger students to serve as role models, answer questions, and help acclimate them to the high school experience. A small group of sophomores who took part in last year’s JumpstART Academy also participated as mentors-in-training.

The JumpstART Academy has proven to be a valuable tool for providing accelerated arts learning, transitioning students from traditional academic programs into an arts-centered high school, creating leadership opportunities for older students, and promoting more successful outcomes for the entire DSA community.

JumpstART Academy student work