Hip-hop education in the heartland

Now celebrating its sixth year, the annual Hip-Hop Educator and Community Leader Training Institute will be held on the University of Wisconsin–Madison campus from July 6 to 10. 

The training is being offered free to Wisconsin classroom teachers.
Now an ongoing partnership between institutions, the UW–Madison Office of Multicultural Initiatives (OMAI) will team up with Urban Word NYC to offer this weeklong program for teachers, educators, community leaders and education students to learn the best practices in hip-hop and spoken word pedagogy.

Winner of the 2007 North American Association of Summer Sessions “Creative and Innovative Program Award,” this institute brings together  leading educators, professors, emcees and activists using the media of spoken word and hip-hop as relevant, dynamic and necessary educational tools to engage students across multi-disciplinary curricula.

Institute participants will learn proven, hands-on techniques that will help them to develop lesson plans and strengthen their course study, as well as create a platform from which they will understand the scope of hip-hop history, culture and politics, says Michael Cirelli, executive director of Urban Word NYC and director of the institute.

“This year’s conference is really aimed at allowing participants to deeply engage their practice in hip-hop, spoken word and social justice pedagogy in real and accountable ways,” Cirelli says. “Teachers will have the opportunity to build with leading scholars and hands on practitioners to hone both the ‘why’ and the ‘how’ we do this important work.”

Participants will have the opportunity to create their own lesson plans and presentations with experts in the fields of hip-hop and social justice pedagogy, as well as Theater of the Oppressed practitioners. These opportunities will help educators deepen their practice as spoken word and hip-hop educators, as well as engaging the best practices in student-centered education models, Cirelli says.

Five full days of sessions are aimed at giving course participants the tools to engage the 21st century classroom. Each day follows a theme that will further strengthen participants’ knowledge and understanding of spoken word and hip-hop culture, politics and pedagogy, as well as social justice and critical literacy frameworks. The afternoon offers “Write, Reflect and Build” sessions where participants interact with the lesson planning process and build their own curricula that engage literacy, critical thinking and creative writing.

At night, programming features readings, panel discussions, hip-hop theater and a concert. The opening night features spoken word legends jessica Care moore and Lemon Anderson, a Tony Award-winning poet from Def Poetry.

Instructors for the 2011 training institute include Cirelli, along with an outstanding selection of spoken word and hip-hop performers and specialists including Christina Marín, Anderson, Intikana, Toni Blackman and Marcella Runnell Hall.  See more about the instructors here.

To apply or register for the institute, click here or contact Shameka Powell, snpowell@wisc.edu, (608) 890-1006.