| |
 |
News
Re:Action 2 - The Second Conference of Urban Improv
Coming June 2nd, 2006 at Harvard ART
The focus of the June conference will be on elementary school aged children,
their needs, and Urban Improv’s powerful violence prevention work with
this population. The event will be at the American Repertory Theater in
Cambridge, where we sponsored a similar conference three years ago.
Our goal is to provide youth educators, administrators in schools and
community centers, public policy officials and other individuals who work
with children, with new resources and ideas for dealing with the epidemic
of youth violence.
Stay tuned for more details coming soon.
Urban Improv Halts Progression of Violent Behaviors
in Youth Three-year Study
ProvesInteractive Theater Program Successful
BOSTON - Urban Improv's interactive theater programs prevent at-risk urban
youth from becoming more violent, aggressive, and disruptive, while enabling
them to pay closer attention and engage more in school, according to the
results of a three-year controlled study of fourth grade students conducted
by the Trauma Center of the Massachusetts Mental Health Institute. The
Trauma Center, a member of the Hamilton Fish Youth Violence Prevention
Consortium, served as an independent evaluator of the Urban Improv program.
Findings from the study were recently presented by Co-Principal Investigators,
Drs. Bessel van der Kolk and Joseph Spinazzola at the Persistently Safe
Schools: National Conference of the Hamilton Fish Institute on School
& Community Violence in Washington, D.C.
"In my 30 years experience dealing with and treating traumatized children,
I have found action oriented, real life exposure techniques, such as those
used by Urban Improv, to be by far the most effective tool," says Dr.
van der Kolk, the medical director of the Trauma Center, author of Psychological
Trauma, and an expert on the developmental, biological, psychodynamic
and interpersonal aspects of the impact of trauma and its treatment.
The investigators reported that Urban Improv -- the school-based interactive
drama program that teaches decision-making, conflict resolution, problem
solving, cooperation, leadership, and values clarification skills -- impedes
the progression of destructive, negative, and violent behavior in elementary
school children by helping youth explore their options in scenes drawn
from real life experiences and understand how their choices alter results
and consequences.
Urban Improv has been offering improvisational workshops and large group
assembly presentations for Boston public schools since 1993. Urban Improv
actors engage 6,000 students annually, in Boston and throughout the region,
in skits that address issues close to their everyday lives including racism,
bullying, self-esteem, domestic violence, substance abuse, and teen pregnancy.
The issues addressed are determined according to the age, need, and education
level of the students as articulated by their teachers, principals, and
community leaders.
Urban Improv programs allow students to participate in action and dialogue
in a supportive and cooperative environment. The actors give voice to
the students' ideas and allow them to influence the outcome of the scenes
being presented, according to Director Toby Dewey. At a critical point
in the scene, the director freezes the action and invites a student to
replace one of the actors. This child then makes the pivotal decision
affecting the outcome of the scene.
"By using their bodies, minds, and emotions, students gain a better understanding
of who they are and what is important to them," Dewey says. "When students
look at the world from a different point of view, they discover new insights,
understanding and empathy. It is through this process that we see a transformation
in those who participate."
The study measured the effect Urban Improv programs had on the behavior
of children who participated, against the behavior of students who had
not participated in the programs. The findings showed that the participating
fourth grade students increased their pro-social behaviors in school,
including cooperation, self-control, and positive self-assertion by the
end of the program, and also exhibited increased classroom engagement
and attention. In addition, they did not display new-onset or increased
aggressive behaviors following their Urban Improv experiences.
By comparison, fourth-grade students who did not participate in Urban
Improv programs exhibited an increase in aggressive behaviors and continued
to withdraw and disengage from social activities, according to study investigators.
"The results of this study confirm what we've observed for more than a
decade: In Urban Improv, students learn that they can choose alternatives
to violence," says Narcissa Campion, Urban Improv Managing Director.
In addition to studying the efficacy of Urban Improv's work, investigators
measured the exposure to violence experienced by the 140 fourth-grade
students from five inner-city Boston schools who participated in the study.
They found that 29.8 percent had seen somebody beaten, shot or seriously
hurt by another person; 27.9 percent personally knew someone who had been
beaten or attacked by another person; 27 percent had been afraid to play
outside or have been made to stay inside because of gangs or drug activities
in their neighborhood; and 18.9 percent had been around people while they
were shooting guns.
"These figures bring home the urgency of providing young children with
all the resources possible to face the unpredictable violent world that
they inhabit," says Dr. van der Kolk. "Without proper intervention these
sort of exposures to violence are associated with increased violence by
the kids themselves, loss of concentration, cynicism, antisocial behavior,
unemployment and teen pregnancy."
The study findings held even for the children who had had the greatest
exposure to violent situations and life stressors (family illness, loss
and or community or domestic violence) prior to the program, according
to Dr. Spinazzola. The investigators are currently in the process of preparing
study findings for submission to a peer-reviewed scientific journal.
About Urban Improv
Founded in 1993, Urban Improv is a violence prevention program for youth
that addresses issues close to their everyday lives including racism,
bullying, self-esteem, domestic violence, substance abuse, and teen pregnancy.
Urban Improv is funded primarily by private donations, grants, and the
annual fundraising event, Banned in Boston.
Institutional support for Urban Improv includes: Massachusetts and Boston
Cultural Councils; Bristol-Meyers Squibb; ExxonMobil Corporation; FleetBoston
Financial; John Hancock Financial Services; Hasbro Children's Foundation,
Hill, Holliday; Hunt Alternatives Fund; Roy A. Hunt Foundation, Klarman
Family Foundation; Rockefeller Foundation; Shapiro Family Foundation;
TJX Foundation.
Urban Improv is a program of the Freelance Players, Inc., a non-profit
organization founded in 1974. For more information about Urban Improv,
call (617) 232-1175.
###
|
|
 |
