The Misty Copeland Foundation

The BE BOLD program has enjoyed significant but thoughtful growth since its launch in Fall 2022. The BE BOLD afterschool program was initially developed under Misty Copelands direction with a diverse set of leaders from ballet, dance education, DEIA training, and child development in partnership with the NDI Collaborative for Teaching and Learning, the professional development center of the National Dance Institute. At the end of BE BOLDs first year, Misty Copeland and Sindy Folgar, BE BOLDs Program Director, recognized a need to include more ballet in the BE BOLD framework. They worked with MCF's current Advisory Council to update and expand the framework to include more ballet. They also extended the program to include 5-7-year-olds.BE BOLD served over 390 children in the Bronx and Harlem in 14 community-based organizations, the majority from districts where most children are of color and the child poverty rate is greater than 30%. BE BOLD is conducted in two 12-week semesters, with sessions meeting twice weekly for one hour per class. The program also offers a truncated program during the summer months, running from 4 to 6 weeks, depending on the site. MCF also increased its number of teaching artists: BE BOLDs active teaching artist roster is now 43 (27 dance educators and 16 musicians), an increase of 150% from one year ago.During the Spring, Hunter College Professor of Education, Gess LeBlanc, Ph.D., co-founder of Hunters Urban Center for Assessment, Research, and Evaluation and a leading speaker and author on culturally responsive teaching, completed the Year 1 evaluation of the BE BOLD program and its teaching methodology. The evaluation confirmed that BE BOLD students demonstrated growth in the specific mindsets and skills MCF seeks to cultivate, which define the programs Portrait of a BE BOLD graduate. The results also verified the success of our efforts to make ballet more inclusive and welcoming.In response to these findings, BE BOLD grew to offer programs for younger children and to provide a more detailed class curriculum. This expansion significantly augments the BE BOLD framework, evolving it from a 29-page guide into a comprehensive 90-page resource. The expanded framework now emphasizes ballet technique. It provides ballet step progression, terminology, and components, thereby improving teaching artists grasp of lesson objectives and consistency in program delivery across sites. Its structure enables teaching artists to tailor lessons to meet their young and older students needs and interests.MCF established a partnership with the Manhattan School of Music, helping to bolster musics role in the BE BOLD program and enhance collaboration with BE BOLD musicians. This alliance ensures music education and exploration are key BE BOLD foundational components.In addition, MCF has added more male teaching artists to its roster to help increase the number of boys enrolled in BE BOLD. We now have 7 male teaching artists who teach dance in our classrooms.