Volume 38, August 2025

WELCOME BACK TO A NEW SCHOOL YEAR!
We are excited about what the 2025–2026 school year brings to Riverside County. We would like to share several new items on our website.

Strategic Arts Plan
The first is the new Strategic Arts Plan which will take us from 2025 through 2030. Written by a dedicated team of artists, artists-in-residence, arts leaders, arts partners, teachers, and administrators, it will serve as our guiding light as we continue to support the visual and performing arts throughout the county.

Art Therapy Lessons
We have also created an Art Therapy lesson booklet for free download and use. These lessons are suitable for a wide range of ages and use inexpensive and easily accessible materials. The goal of these lessons is to de-stress and center the participant as they engage in the healing process of creating.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 1

Innovative approaches for equitable and exciting opportunities in the visual and performing arts for students during school closures from Riverside County Arts leads.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 2

Meridy Volz's "Art with Heart" program at Indio Juvenile Hall was an instant success, and she was determined to continue teaching even as COVID-19 prevented her from entering the facility.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 3

The Our Town Cultural Arts Program brings the cultural arts into elementary school classrooms in the Murrieta Valley Unified School District, engaging students in the traditions and cultures of the citizens who make up our community and the students who sit in our classrooms.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 4

Lady Lead (LL) was founded five years ago by Louisa Higgins, Visual and Performing Arts, and Sarah Scheideman, Artist from Palm Springs Unified School District as a way for middle school girls of promise to interact with female art mentors while doing an arts and crafts project.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 5

Riverside Unified School District's performing arts students join in a partnership project with the community.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 6

In the spring of 2020 the Val Verde Unified School District initiated a Student Quarantine Art Contest, inspired by the Getty Challenge. Students were asked to select a piece of artwork from Google Arts and Culture and re-create it.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 7

The Moreno Valley Unified School District’s Visual and Performing Arts (VAPA) program was reinvented in 2015 as an investment for all students and has proven to be an exceptional program with its recent Golden Bell Award designation.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 8

In this month’s edition of Amplifying the Arts, we would like to celebrate the California School Board Association Golden Bell Award received by Murrieta Valley Unified School District’s VAPA program called Horizons Unlimited. 

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 9

Riverside County Office of Education, Visual and Performing Arts, is proud to partner with the McCallum Theatre Education to present its online series.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 10

Riverside County Visual and Performing Arts (VAPA) is pleased to partner with Desert X to announce its student and family resources for the 2021 Exhibition.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 11

Riverside County Office of Education is proud to support Mono County Office of Education, which is one of the four collaborative counties in the Region 10 service region of the California County Superintendents Educational Services Association. 

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 12

As we start a new school year, RCOE VAPA would like to share several noteworthy arts recognitions in Riverside County from the spring and summer, as well as a few new events just around the corner.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 13

Riverside County Office of Education Visual and Performing Arts partnered with Inlandia Institute to create the inaugural Riverside County Teen Poet Laureate event. 

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 14

In the Spring of 2021, Louisa Higgins, Arts Administrator, and Peggy Burt, Arts Consultant, began an in-depth study of the new Arts Framework, which was published in 2020.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 15

Riverside County Office of Education Visual and Performing Arts is pleased to partner with the Palm Springs Art Museum to promote their new online program.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 16

RCOE VAPA is partnering with CSSSA to get the word out about their Summer School for the Arts!

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 17

The past two years have seen our share of individual and collective trauma based on the effects of the worldwide pandemic. 

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 18

Riverside County Office of Education is partnering with The Redlands Symphony to promote this year’s OrKIDstra music education program to you and your students; an original animated video of a performance of Sergei Prokofiev’s immortal Peter and the Wolf.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 19

Louisa Higgins, Arts Administrator and Jeannine Flores, Los Angeles County Office of Education Arts & STEAM Coordinator have just wrapped up their yearlong project on behalf of CCSESA. Their revised unit of the Creativity at the Core Module 12 is entitled Leadership in Arts Education.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 20

We would like to introduce to a broader audience is the PowerPoint entitled “Cultural Responsiveness in Arts Education.” Written and presented by Dr. Charles Brown, Director at the Riverside County Office of Education.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 21

The Arts at Riverside County Office of Education is very pleased to be able to partner with KQED in sharing some free and valuable resources for Riverside County teachers.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 22

Louisa Higgins, Arts Administrator and Jeannine Flores, Los Angeles County Office of Education Arts & STEAM Coordinator have just wrapped up their yearlong project on behalf of CCSESA.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 23

Arts as Life! is very low cost (only $23.00 per teacher/class) and open to all TK–12 teachers, administration, staff, and counselors.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 24

Louisa Higgins, Arts Administrator and Jeannine Flores, Los Angeles County Office of Education Arts & STEAM Coordinator are continuing to promote their yearlong project on behalf of CCSESA.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 25

Louisa Higgins, Arts Administrator and Jeannine Flores, Los Angeles County Office of Education Arts & STEAM Coordinator are continuing to promote their yearlong project on behalf of CCSESA. 

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 26

New for 2023 is the RCOE Get Your Style On Fashion + Art Competition. This contest gave the opportunity to link the worlds of art and fashion
through a creation while showing off one’s creativity and design prowess!

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 27

Louisa Higgins, Arts Administrator and Jeannine Flores, Los Angeles County Office of Education Arts & STEAM Coordinator undertook a yearlong project on behalf of the California County Superintendents. Their revised unit of the Creativity at the Core Module 12 is entitled Leadership in Arts Education.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 28

This edition of Amplifying the Arts highlights the RCOE partnership with the Palm
Springs Young Playwrights Festival (PSYPF). PSYPF promotes and encourages theatrical creative writing to all elementary, middle, and high school students within Riverside County.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 29

Each year, The Arts at Riverside County Office of Education holds two competitions that center on poetry; “If I Speak, Will You Listen?” Spoken Word Invitational and the Teen Poet Laureate competition.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 30

In the five years that the Arts at RCOE has been in existence, we have been striving to promote and expand the arts for the over 430,000 students in Riverside County.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 31

The Arts at Riverside County Office of Education (RCOE) has many Students Arts Showcases available each year for parents and teachers to submit student artwork in art, music, poetry, film, theater, dance, and fashion.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 32

The Arts at RCOE has some free new arts resources to offer as we open the 2024–2025 school year!

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 33

The Arts at RCOE is pleased to announce their partnership with the Benton Museum of Art at Pomona College. We are particularly excited for teachers to know about their SEARCH THE POMONA COLLEGE COLLECTION, which is a free service available to teachers. What a great way to incorporate free online images for study or lesson plans!

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 34

The Arts at RCOE began a partnership with Sunnylands during the 2022–2023 school year.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 35

Beginning in the 2024–2025 school year, Riverside County Office of Education’s Alternative Education and Instructional Services units began working collaboratively, utilizing Prop 28 funding to add arts to the school day at all of the county’s court and community schools.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 36

During the Covid shutdown, Louisa Higgins, RCOE Arts Administrator and Karen Riley, Artist, began to write a series of lessons based on children’s literature books.

Amplifying the Arts, Volume 37

The Hundred Dresses Trunk Show was a significant collaborative effort curated by Louisa Higgins, Riverside County Office of Education Arts Administrator, and Karen Riley, S.C.R.A.P. Gallery Executive Director. 

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