Arts Programs for Schools

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Overview: Youth Art Exchange offers residencies to public, independent, and parochial schools in San Francisco in visual and performing arts and architecture. With over 20 years of youth-centered arts learning, our programming lives at the intersection of arts education and youth development. We aim to spark a shared creative practice between professional artists and high school students, furthering youth as leaders, thinkers, and artists in San Francisco. By hiring an exemplary, diverse faculty of practicing Bay Area artists, our residencies are engaging for youth as they develop technical arts skills and values for a lifelong practice. Our curriculum framework incorporates CA VAPA standards, project-based learning, Creative Youth Development, and building social and emotional skills. 

Disciplines Offered: Our faculty artists span multiple disciplines including:

  • Architecture

  • Animation

  • Comic Book Illustration

  • Dance

  • Darkroom & Digital Photography 

  • Fashion Design

  • Filmmaking

  • Mural Painting

  • Music Production

  • Printmaking

  • + more by request!

Residency Types Offered: We offer different options for residencies, depending on school need and availability of artists. Residencies are customizable to school and student interests. 

  • Arts Integration: School teachers and our faculty artists develop a collaborative project-based curriculum that integrates the art discipline with the academic subject, meeting learning objectives of that subject and foundational skills in the discipline. This is typically 4-12 weeks over the course of a semester.

  • Arts Elective: Our faculty artists instruct an arts curriculum during an elective class period. This is typically the entire semester and is supported by school staff/teachers assigned to the classroom. 

  • Workshops: 2-day limited duration workshop series for up to 2 hours/day in a selected discipline. 

  • After School Programming: YAX’s after school programs for SFUSD high school students are free for youth participants at YAX and other community-based sites. Please spread the word to your students! If you would like to offer YAX after school enrichment at your school, we are able to offer onsite, after school enrichment programming. 

  • YAX Studios in the Mission + Excelsior: We can host field trips, classes and exhibits at our art spaces.

San Francisco Youth Arts Summit: The annual San Francisco Youth Arts Summit is an annual gathering of young artists and arts educators facilitated by YAX. The event includes exhibitions, performances, and workshops and is an opportunity to showcase student work from schools and community settings. We invite you to participate and look forward to showcasing work from our residencies. 

Calculating Costs: Costs depend on the frequency and duration of the residency, as well as YAX’s California Arts Council Artist in Schools grant program funds to subsidize the cost of the residency. After an initial meeting to understand your school’s needs for a residency or workshop, we will provide a customized quote. After an initial meeting to understand your school’s needs for a residency or workshop, we will provide a customized quote.

Contact: To request a residency or schedule a meeting to discuss Youth Art Exchange residency options, please contact Director of Education + Programs, Anna Calonje, at  anna@youthartexchange.org or call (415) 971-8693. You may also fill out this form.

Residencies

Current and previous school partners include:

  • Academy SF @ McAteer

  • Sterne School

  • CAL Academy

  • John O’Connell High School

  • June Jordan School for Equity

  • James Baldwin Academy

  • Red Bridge School

  • Burton High School

  • and more!