A Note
From Sarah Vowell
and Dave Eggers,
on Behalf of
the Students
and Staff
of NOCCA.
- - - -
We both had the pleasure of visiting the New Orleans Center for Creative
Arts (NOCCA) last year, and it is stunning. It is the most extensive, brilliantly planned, and exciting high-school arts school we've ever seen. Founded and nurtured by the Marsalis family, it's a state-of-the-art facility where talented students can hone their crafts in every conceivable art: music, visual art, writing, dance, theater. It is very difficult to describe
how stunning and successful this program is. It has been essential to the lives of generations of young people whose success in high school, in college, and in life, depends on the development of their extra-academic talents.
Now this institution is being gravely threatened.
NOCCA is presently facing massive, crippling cuts in the Louisiana State Legislature, under HB156. Although the state is in the difficult position of balancing its decimated budget, this is a vital institution for the children of the state, the arts, and the rebuilding efforts of the city in general. NOCCA is internationally recognized as a premier arts training school, and is a model for such programs around the world. Last year alone, the senior class garnered over $4,000,000 in college scholarships, testimony to the importance of NOCCA for the future of its students and also for the vitality of culture in Louisiana and the country.
The special legislative session ends on November 22. There is still time to voice your support for NOCCA by contacting:
Governor Kathleen Babineaux Blanco
(866) 366-1121,
fax (225) 342-7099
e-mail through www.gov.state.la.us
Or two key legislators:
Diana Bajoie (pronounced BA-zhwa)
websen@legis.state.la.us
(504) 568-7760
Francis C. Heitmeier
heitmeirf@legis.state.la.us
(504) 361-6014
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The Idyllwild Arts Academy is raising funds to provide full scholarships to 16 NOCCA students. For more information, click here.
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