FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Date: November 13, 2007

Contact: Stephanie Thompson

E-Mail: stephanie.thompson@cityballet.org

Phone: 619.840.7353

City Ballet of San Diego Launches
Revolutionary Ballet Program
at Hamilton Elementary

- All Second Graders Taking Ballet Weekly for 24 Weeks -

SAN DIEGO - City Ballet of San Diego, under the direction of Steven and Elizabeth Wistrich, has launched a revolutionary public school enrichment program with Hamilton Elementary School, in the economically challenged neighborhood of City Heights.

For the first time, City Ballet's "Discover a Dancer" program will include all children in one grade at one school, with no signups necessary.  Starting Oct. 1, all 120 second-graders at Hamilton Elementary School, boys and girls, have been taking a ballet class for one hour each week, for a period of 24 weeks.  This program is being funded in part by a grant from the California Arts Council.

Since 1997, City Ballet’s "Discover a Dancer" program has been providing dance training, dance attire, and education of ballet as an art form for disadvantaged children and youth at risk.  This program offers a creative alternative to violence, gang association, substances abuse, and leaving school for children whose family environment would probably never offer exposure to ballet.  Ballet class is a great equalizer for children, no matter what their social-economic background.

For the past nine years, children from inner-city Title I schools attend weekly ballet classes conducted by City Ballet instructors at the City Heights Performance Annex for 50 weeks, and are given tickets to attend professional ballet concerts with their family and the opportunity for each child to participate in City Ballet's Student Performance presented yearly.  This is the first time the "Discover a Dancer" program has been taken into a school.

The school has set aside a room for the ballet classes and the children are being provided with ballet slippers.  There are six classes of 20 students each, who will cycle through the room throughout the day under the supervision of City Ballet instructors, John Nettles and Ellen Davis.

"This is the biggest education program City Ballet has ever undertaken," said Artistic Director Steven Wistrich.  "It is truly revolutionary, both for the school and our company.  To bring this enrichment program to the entire second grade, and not just a select few who have taken the initiative to seek it out, is making a strong statement that arts education is as important as math, science, or languages.  We are honored to be partnering with Hamilton Elementary and the school's remarkable principal, Lillie McMillan, to make this program happen."

ABOUT CITY BALLET

Heralded as "a top-tier dance company" and "an oasis of classical dance in a city otherwise too often a desert," City Ballet is San Diego's world-class professional ballet company, now celebrating its fifteenth season, and under the direction of former Boston Ballet and Stuttgart Ballet dancers Steven and Elizabeth Wistrich.  City Ballet is a non-profit organization committed to furthering the ballet art form.  The company produces classic and contemporary ballet programs that critics rave as "polished, eye-catching and delightful," and "highly entertaining and professional."  International dance critic Sheila Orysiek wrote in 2006, "San Diego finally has a classical ballet company that is worthy of the name."

Unsurpassed training programs for children and pre-professionals are offered at City Ballet School, the official school for the City Ballet Company, whose alumnae dance with companies including American Ballet Theatre, Pittsburg Ballet, Pennsylvania Ballet and The Joffrey Ballet.  City Ballet's innovative education programs range from arts outreach to inner-city children to bringing the world's best ballet instructors to San Diego.

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