"Birthing New Beginnings Performing Arts Academy (BNBA) will provide girls K-12 in Baltimore City with a rigorous academic curriculum combined with an intense curriculum and trainings in dance and theatre that will prepare each girl for college and transition them to succeed in life as respectful, intellectually stimulating and productive young women of society". Birthing New Beginnings Performing Arts Academy ( BNBA) vision is ensure that each girl recognizes that she is her own individual who honors her intellect, cultivates her confidence and discover her passion. Our mission prepares each girl to fulfill her untapped gifts while achieving her academic education by celebrating her strengths, transforming her from a dreamer to a doer, nourishing her mind and character. BNBA engages each girl from where they are to where she dreams to go in life. BNBA girls will identify, acknowledge and accept that they are courageous, beautiful in and out, ethical, an artist, a leader, resourceful individuals and a compassionate person despite what others may think about her. Each girl will be ready to face the known and unknown tasks in life that will be set in their pathways as she travels through her own journey of success. BNBA can’t accomplish these goals and expectations without the support of our parents, families, peers and community because it takes a village to raise our girls to young women. BNB will provide exceptional leadership and instructional staff dedicated and equipped to produce the strongest academic outcomes, and welcomes the participation and partnership of parents and community members in our students’ education. Every BNBA graduate will be prepared to enter and succeed in college. BNBA will prove that all students can accomplish incredible goals when they are held to high standards, exposed to relevant learning experiences, provided targeted intervention, and supported in a nurturing environment. Despite the social and economic challenges faced by residents of this community, BNBA students are defying the odds by demonstrating exceptional academic excellence. This innovative new school will focus on the performing arts, with emphasis on using dance and theatre as pathways to academic success for all students. Through its anchor partnership with A Better Chance for Females, Inc., the school will become a cultural hub for the community it serves. Its curriculum will integrate the rich indigenous dance and percussion traditions of dance and musical heritage to create a fusion with contemporary expressions of dance and music. Collaboration between dance, theatre and with academic subjects will be central to the school’s culture, policies and instructional strategies. The design team of the Birthing New Beginnings Performing Arts Academy includes a group of highly qualified teachers with many years of successful teaching experience in challenging urban schools in Baltimore. Teachers on the design team bring substantial backgrounds in the performing arts, entertainment and arts education. We have incorporated a group of retired teachers to build a strong curriculum for our girls and they will also be mentors to teachers working at BNBA. These retired teachers will assist BNBA with lesson plans, organizational skills in classroom, monitor classes to give strategic plans for a successful teachers outcome along with other services needed for our teachers to excel in their career as a teacher. Parents who are committed to supporting a dynamic, responsive school culture, with high expectations for all stakeholders, will be involved in planning their children’s future at this school. Students who are ready to take responsibility for their futures by serving as student leaders within the new school community have been enlisted as agents of change in this project, as well. Students at all levels of success and connection to school have been consulted in the course of building a vision of the best possible K-12 school experience for this West Baltimore Community. BNBA plans to serve single-gender girls in grades k-12, we look forward to the opportunity to define the students in the inner–city of Baltimore by their strengths and not by their deficiencies as we support them in their areas of need. Our students will be culturally rich, ready to learn, respond to cooperative learning strategies, and believe in the importance of postsecondary education. The barriers to achievement that have impacted them in the past include: large, impersonal elementary, middle and high schools, lack of information about performing arts and college, lack of mentors and support for class achievement completion of university application components, inconsistent counseling support, ineffective teaching strategies, and a bell schedule that limits their access to appropriate intervention classes and that severely limits their choices in creating a career pathway during their school years. We are proud to announce our location for Birthing New Beginnings Performing Arts Academy (for girls), 5010 Briarcliff Road, Baltimore, Maryland 21229. This will be the prime location for our school due to the new housing development in Edmondson Village called Uplands that will be opening in 2012 the same time that our school will be proposed to open. As we know that schools in this community is limited due to closings and will become more crowded after the new community development opens. Also, BNBA will bring attraction to the community by providing parents and girls with an opportunity to explore educational options. We will be a great asset to the community and the city of Baltimore by bring the arts to the urban community and exposing the knowledge of the arts that maybe overlooked in our urban communities. We ask that you commit to supporting us by signing this petition as we bring a private school setting with performing arts in our urban community to expose our young girls to other pathways in life besides the things they are exposed to and feel that there is no other way. Let’s join together to assist them in discovering their untapped gifts. We will also offer outreach programs in the community for all youths as well as extended services for all girls in the community that may not have the opportunity of attending BNBA. Department of Education will not be granting funds to Baltimore City for implementation, design and planning at the time so we are not allowing that to be our focus of not moving forward to prepare for the opening of the school because the need still exist where funds are available or not so, please HELP us in any way possible and all donations are a tax credit. Thanks in advance for all your support and assistance in making this vision become a reality for the girls in inner city Baltimore. If you want to make any donations of any kind to the school please contact us at: BNBPAA@gmail.com Things needed for Donations: Financial Support Support Letters Sponsors Web Designer Volunteers Board Members School Items (Furniture, Supplies, etc.) Uniform Designer Adopt a Girl for the school year Grant writers Many things are and will be needed throughout the process of the school implementation along with school duration. Sincerely, Karen L. White, Founder/CEO and Founding Group of Birthing New Beginnings Performing Arts Academy

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