Thank you to the artists, performers and all who donated for making this year’s fundraiser a huge success!
Student Artists for Science Education
2019 Fundraiser
Student Music, Dance, and Art Show
to Benefit Science Education at Excel Academy Charter Schools
May 17th at 7pm Newton North High School Little Theatre
Join Student Artists for Science Education for an evening of dance, music, and art! 100% of the money raised will go towards purchasing science equipment for Excel Charter Schools.
Performances by Newton North’s stellar a capella group the Melocotones, a Newton South jazz quartet, a guitarist and singer from Newton North, dancers from the Boston Ballet School and All That Jazz, and a world-class violinist. Additionally, there will be an auction of student art by Newton North art students.
Donations will benefit Excel Academy Charter Schools. Excel’s students, the majority of whom will be the first in their families to attend college, are among the most underserved learners in the cities of Boston and Chelsea. Excel was created to address the opportunity gap that exists in communities where approximately 10% of students will graduate from college. To date, seniors from the first-ever graduating class from Excel Academy Charter High School have been accepted into colleges such as Harvard, Yale, Brown, Princeton, Dartmouth, Amherst, Williams, Boston College, Boston University, Tufts, Johns Hopkins, Harvey Mudd, Bryn Mawr, and many more. Help us support Excel’s amazing work!
Student Artists
Students of the All that Jazz Dance Studio
Miss Deb Vogel began All That Jazz twenty-one years ago with the desire to enable all children, regardless of experience or age, to learn the art and joy of dance. Having now grown into a thriving and lively dance community of hundreds of students, we still pride ourselves on having that same philosophy. All of our classes are taught by our experienced and energetic faculty who simply love teaching children how to dance. At All That Jazz, students get the positive benefits of having the director of the studio personally teach the majority of the classes, as well as taking a “hands on” approach to all classes. Our teachers are not only extremely knowledgeable about dance technique but also about children and their self-esteem. Students are thus learning how to dance and how to dance well in a safe but challenging environment. We invite you to experience our award winning All That Jazz community today!
KEila Wakao
Keila Wakao, 13, began studying the violin at age of 3, and has been performing in many places, such as Japan, Germany, New York City, New Jersey, and throughout Massachusetts. She studies violin at the New England Conservatory of Music and the Perlman Music Program and is a student under Itzhak Perlman, Don Weilerstein, Soovin Kim and Anait Arutunian. She has won many competitions and performed as a soloist with orchestras in the past, most recently she played Mendelssohn Violin Concerto with the Boston Civic Symphony at Jordan Hall in Boston.
Grace davis
Grace is a freshman at Newton North High School who has been playing guitar for nine years. On top of singing and guitar lessons, Grace plays soccer, lacrosse, and runs track for Newton North.
Melocotones
Melocotones is one of Newton North’s coed a cappella groups directed by students Ben Gobler, Jai Khurana and Anna Weylman-Farwell. They perform at school-related performances as well as places around Newton. Melocotones usually sing a mix of classic a cappella songs mixed with pop and other styles.
Students of the Boston Ballet School
Brought to you by advanced Boston Ballet dancers, this piece, choreographed by Jessica Wu, will delight and inspire you. Dancing in the piece is Newton North’s own Hannah Zupancic, along with two other high school students: Kiku Wang and Azusa. All four dancers have been educated for roughly a decade at Boston Ballet, a ballet school devoted to supplying a high quality dance education and cultivating a love of dance.
100% of your donation will go directly to purchase equipment for science labs at Excel Academy Charter Schools.
About Excel Academy Charter Schools
Excel Academy Charter Schools’s mission is to prepare students to succeed in high school and college, apply their learning to solve relevant problems, and engage productively in their communities.
Excel Academy Charter Schools is a network of tuition-free, public charter schools serving the Massachusetts communities of East Boston and Chelsea. It was founded to address the severe academic underperformance and low college matriculation rates of the student populations in these neighborhoods. Our founders envisioned a free, public school alternative where all students would be held to the highest academic and behavioral expectations, and college would become a reality. As a true public school, Excel is defined not by whom we exclude but by whom we include in our community. We are proud of the fact that we serve many students with special needs.
The network’s first school opened in fall 2003 in East Boston and now serves 224 students in grades 5 through 8. Excel Academy Chelsea, the 2nd school in our network, opened in fall 2011. Our third school, Excel Academy Orient Heights, opened in August of 2012. Our first high school, Excel Academy Charter High School, opened in fall 2015. Excel now educates 1,300 students in grades 5 through 12, and will enroll close to 1,400 students next year.
Since its founding, Excel has adopted the identity of being a college-preparatory school — first as a single-site middle school, then as three middle schools, and now as a middle and high school network. Our purpose and theory of change is clear: we believe that a college degree has the potential to fundamentally change our students’ life trajectories and close the opportunity gap that exists between kids growing up in disadvantaged circumstances and those who do not. Excel focuses on college from the day students arrive in 5th grade, and now with a high school of our own, we are closer than ever to ensuring our students are prepared for a 21st century economy.
Our students, the majority of whom will be the first in their families to attend college, are among the most underserved learners in the cities of Boston and Chelsea. Traditionally, these students score significantly below the state average on annual math and English MCAS examinations. One of the fundamental reasons Excel was created was to address this opportunity gap, and we have done so effectively over the last sixteen years.
We are a true public school in that our students reflect the local communities we serve. Excel’s student population consists of the following demographics:
- Approximately 75% Latino and 80% low-income
- Roughly 55% of students report speaking a language other than English at home
- Approximately 20% receive Special Education services across our four schools
- Only 16% of children report having parents who have pursued education beyond a high school degree
- On average, over two-thirds of our fifth graders arrive at Excel reading three or more grade levels below the educational standard for their age-level, and with computation skills that test at two or more grade levels below standard
Excel is a proud member of The Network, a select group of the highest performing Building Excellent Schools (BES) schools. The Network challenges and supports high capacity leaders to examine and improve the quality growth of their organizations.
About Student Artists for Science Education
Student Artists for Science Education was founded by Julia Davis combining her interests in dance arts and science education. Julia is a junior at Newton North, and she is enthusiastic about the intersection of art and science. She dances at Boston Ballet, plays electric guitar, and loves the sciences, specifically physics! She founded STEAM Club, a club at North devoted to exploring the interdisciplinary fields of art and science. She also volunteers every weekend at the Harvard Museums of Science and Culture, and is continuing her physics coursework during the summer months at Harvard. Julia founded this fundraiser because she is passionate about science, and she wants all students to have the same opportunities in their exploration of science that she does at North.