Dream school

Chattanooga’s Center for Creative Arts has become the school I dreamed of years ago as a Hamilton County student

By Kathy Allison

Zoltan Kodaly, the Hungarian composer, once was asked when to begin the study of music with children. He responded, “…ridiculously early. Nine months before the birth of the mother.”
My formal arts education began when I was 5, one of many in a chorus line of bunnies in ballet slippers. After discovering that I wasn’t designed for dance, my mother wisely enrolled me in piano lessons. Who would believe that in the early 1960s, private piano lessons were offered in one of Hamilton County’s public schools?
When we moved to northeast Hixson, our family discovered disparity in the quality and quantity of arts education within the school district. I excelled in academic coursework but longed for artistic opportunities. If my parents hadn’t provided private lessons, I thought, how would I have learned about the arts? It was an unusually adult understanding for an elementary school student, and looking back, I think it was quite possibly a call to action.
With my transition to junior high school came the difficult decision between band or chorus, because students were not allowed to do both. Home economics could be taken along with one arts class. Apparently sewing an apron was significant; music of the masters wasn’t! In my high school, band was the only arts course offered—no chorus or theatre or dance or art.
To right this wrong, I decided to become an educator and entered UTC as a music education major. Imagine my surprise when I found that within an institutional setting, one could study both vocal and instrumental music—simultaneously! I enjoyed theatre and art classes; I designed and built costumes for the Opera Workshop. And I wondered: Why was it necessary to reserve these rich artistic opportunities for college students?
In professing to be an arts educator, I would be officially obligated to help choose the direction of curriculum. It would be my goal to give children many happy experiences in an effort to strengthen their enjoyment of the arts.

Magnetic attraction
Click forward to the present. I’ve been an arts educator for 31 years; I’m still in a public school. This school differs from the public schools of my upbringing. All students in my school have the opportunity to choose from a menu of 70 arts courses. Here, parents of young actors, artists, dancers, musicians and writers can expect and receive support for the artistic endeavors of their children in a public school setting.
It is my dream school—a place in which students with a passion for the arts can pursue artistic and academic excellence. It is an environment where the arts and academics share center stage. It is a climate where the arts are valued as a significant aesthetic experience.
The Center for Creative Arts, Chattanooga’s magnet school for the fine arts, is located in North Chattanooga, but as a dedicated magnet school, it has no attendance zone. CCA’s students come from across Hamilton County, attracted to this magnet because they live and breathe the arts.
The admissions process to CCA involves an audition and interview. There are five majors offered: art, dance, music, theatre and writing. Music majors choose a concentration in vocal or instrumental music, and theatre majors choose a concentration in acting, musical theatre or technical theatre.
During the middle school years, students take year-long, 90-minute classes in their major and a year-long elective in another discipline of their choice. It is what I would have wanted as a child and what current arts research supports. What I would have given, as a student, to take band every year and have the added opportunity to sing in the chorus, or dance, or create ceramics, or write poetry. Imagine the possibilities!
In their freshman and sophomore years, students take five academic classes and three arts classes; as juniors and seniors they take four academic and four arts classes.  Graduates leave CCA well prepared for highly selective universities and conservatories.  Scholarships are abundant, and students are prepared for a lifelong pursuit of the arts as a vocation or avocation.
Academically, CCA’s students follow the same college path curriculum as students in any Hamilton County school. There are honors, advanced placement, virtual and dual enrollment courses available.

The right school for the right kid
You’ll know that CCA is the place for your child if he or she is already enjoying the youth programs at the Chattanooga Theatre Centre, performances at Barking Legs Theatre or the UTC Departments of Music or Theatre and Speech, classes at Ballet Tennessee or Chattanooga Ballet, or exhibits at the Hunter Museum or Association of Visual Artists, or if he or she is studying music at Cadek Conservatory or with a private instructor, playing in one of the Chattanooga Symphony Youth Orchestras, or singing with the Chattanooga Boys or Girls Choir. These organizations, along with others, are Partners in Education with CCA, working to ensure quality arts education for the children of Hamilton County.
If your child has been involved in any of the fine arts educational programs in our community, he or she may have developed a taste for an artistic field. Now he or she may be ready to pursue and develop that penchant into a passion. CCA exists to feed a hunger for the arts. In providing that opportunity, the Center for Creative Arts has become the school I dreamed of years ago as a Hamilton County student.
Want to see this school for yourself? Tours are available without appointment most Tuesdays in November, December and January at 9:30 a.m.
Want to enroll?  Applications for the 2009–10 school year will be accepted Nov. 1 through Jan. 31. Apply online at HCDE.org/magnet. Auditions are held in early February.

pull-out bio

Kathy Allison is dean of fine arts at the Center for Creative Arts, director of the adult handbell choir at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, member of Chattanooga’s Public Art Committee, costume mistress for Chattanooga Symphony and Opera, and first female member of the International Alliance of Theatrical and Stage Employees, Local 140. She wishes to thank her parents, June and Steve Allison, for years of piano lessons, the best Hammond organ money could buy, and their continued support of her artistic efforts.

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About CCA

The Center for Creative Arts, located 1301 Dallas Rd. in North Chattanooga, is a John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts Creative Ticket National School of Distinction, a Tennessee Alliance for Arts Education Creative Ticket School of Excellence, an International NETWORK of Schools for the Advancement of Arts Education Star School, a NETWORK of Performing and Visual Arts Schools New and Emerging School Award Recipient and a Magnet School of America School of Distinction. Contact CCA at 209-5929.