Tuesday, November 12th, 2019

1:15 PM - 2:00 PM, Dr. Jackie: The Innovation Forum

Session II: Herscher Hall, Guerin C

Music, Film, the Arts and Sports! Creativity and Wellness as the Foundation of Education

Frank Guttler, Program Director, Mobile Film Classroom

Sergio Cuculiza, Executive Director and co-founder of Beautify Earth; Founder of Beautify Education

Johnathan Franklin, Manager of Community Affairs and Engagement, Los Angeles Rams

Nadine Levitt, CEO and founder, WURRLYedu

Shannon McLemore, Actor, Writer, Producer, and Educator

Meia Johnson, Senior Program Associate, LA County Department of Arts and Culture

Victoria Lanier, Executive Director, Education Through Music-Los Angeles, Moderator

Frank Guttler, Director of Programs for the Mobile Film Classroom is a graduate of the California State University, Northridge School of Cinema & Television and is an accomplished educator and digital storytelling and media arts expert with nearly two decades’ experience in connecting education with technology, literacy and filmmaking. After a career in news, televisions and film production Frank was recruited by the American Film Institute (AFI) to produce workshops & seminars for AFI's Professional Training Division. He developed the groundbreaking training curriculum for AFI's K-12 Screen Education Center to make the tools and processes of filmmakers accessible to educators of all subjects and grade levels. In addition to his work with adult at the Los Angeles County Office of Education and Wilkes University Graduate School of Education, Frank is a former classroom video teacher having developed a career-track

media production program at International Polytechnic High School. Frank was a teaching artist for the Skirball Cultural Center's Teaching our World through the Arts program and Teaching Artist-in-Residence at the Palm Springs Unified School District. He was Director of Curriculum at DIGICOM Learning and was Lead Faculty at the Flat Classroom Conferences in Qatar, China, Switzerland. Frank has a busy independent consultancy, Lights, Camera, Learn! and has lead filmmaking workshops and seminars for the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, Apple Distinguished Educators, Discovery Educator Network, Macworld Conference, California Association of Independent Schools, International Society for Technology in Education and the Google Teacher Academy.

Victoria Lanier founded Education Through Music-LA in 2006 as the first independent affiliate of the successful ETM model.  Under her leadership, ETM-LA has grown to currently serve over 15,000 at-risk youth.  She has been honored by the Ralph Lauren Polo G.I.V.E. Campaign and Los Angeles City Hall for her community work, and plays an active role in LA County’s Arts Innovation Lab to provide equity and access of the arts to all students.  She holds degrees from Princeton and Columbia Universities and has recorded violin for Fox Simpsons, Kanye West, and Christina Aguilera.

Meia Johnson serves as an Arts Education Program Manager at the Los Angeles County Arts Commission.  Ms. Johnson guides work of the Creative Pathways for Youth initiative (formerly Teen Arts Pathways), one of five initiatives currently funded as part of Cultural Equity & Inclusion Initiative (CEII), which aims to prepare youth for careers in the arts and creative industries, by creating access to work-based learning and leadership opportunities for junior high and high school students, particularly students of color, low-income students, LGBTQ students, disabled students, current and former foster youth, and youth on probation, as well as others who experience barriers to participation in the workforce.  Ms. Johnson is committed to cultural equity and inclusion and seeks to identify, align and leverage resources for providing youth, ages 15-24 years old, with concrete entry points into the creative economy. In addition to her role in helping to build Creative Career Pathways for Youth, she oversees the work of the newly formed LA County Arts Education Collective’s Youth Advisory Council which is helping to guide a new countywide regional plan for arts education. Ms. Johnson has extensive experience in designing, implementing and administrating workforce development programs for youth. Ms. Johnson’s experience also includes community planning, nonprofit management and organizational development consultation. Ms. Johnson is a senior faculty member and subject-matter expert within the School of Business at the University of Phoenix. She has a bachelor’s in journalism, a bachelor’s Pan African Studies and a Master of Public Administration from California State University, Northridge.

Nadine Levitt, CEO and founder, WURRLYedu: Nadine is a Swiss-born German, Kiwi, US transplant, and founder of the music education company, Wurrly, LLC. She began her career as a lawyer but after 6 years of practice she began to pursue a career in music as a professional opera singer and songwriter. She has performed extensively all over the United States and the world, sharing the stage with David Foster, Andrea Boccelli, Kiri Te Kanawa, Roger Daltry, Christina Perri, and Steven Tyler to name a few. Passionate about music in schools she sits on the national board of Little Kids Rock and on the Advisory Board of Harmony Project, and in 2016 led the development of the music education platform WURRLYedu, which is a three pronged solution for music educators. She believes the best learning to be experiential and inspired, "if you can inspire kids you can drive them to practice, then to record themselves, then to reflect on what was recorded, which will inherently drive them back to inspiration, feeding curiosity and creative development." She studied at Auckland University, and holds a Bachelor of Law and Arts.

Shannon McLemore is an actor, writer, producer, and educator in the Los Angeles area.  Raised in a small town in Georgia, she went on to receive her BFA in Acting from Southern Methodist University and her MFA in Acting from UCLA.  She has gone on to appear in numerous plays, Emmy winning television shows, commercials, and independent films: ER, Lie to Me, Southland, Battle Creek, Six Characters in Search of an Author, Tartuffe, and The Marriage of Figaro, to name a few.  Her work has garnered awards and accolades worldwide for its riveting honesty and depth.  Shannon has married her artistic endeavors with a fierce commitment and passion for educating and empowering artists who are working actively in film and television, as well as those making their first foray into an often intimidating and overwhelming industry.  She has been a private coach for actors on television shows and in major motion pictures and has taught at UCLA, Stuart Rogers Studios, and currently teaches at the New York Film Academy.  Her recent work has focused on young children and teenagers and developing their acting skills to have a successful career in the arts.  Shannon believes that art is about truth; it can improve the world around us by opening up our awareness of an outside experience and belief, causing us to empathize with a life and background that may be different from our own, as well as giving us insight and understanding into our own personal lives.

Sergio Cuculiza, Executive Director and co-founder of Beautify Earth; Founder of Beautify Education. Beautify Earth is a Non-Profit using artists, community members and murals to help better the urban environment, its people, and overall human empowerment. Sergio was born in Atlanta, Georgia and grew up in Fort Lauderdale, Florida and Lima, Peru, where his family is from. Studying Architecture at SCAD (Savannah College of Art and design) his education and inspiration has evolved into his practice. Integrating art and teaching into his work and passions. He helped found Beautify Earth and created the Beautify Education program, which established a viable solution to the beautification of school campuses and the empowerment of its students/teachers using the help of art and creativity. Using an interactive approach and with the help of professional artists and designers, it has helped create several inspiring environments through the power of the arts and creativity. Having painted over 100 murals at over 30 schools in Southern California, Beautify Earth's goal is to create a change in our educational system, instilling creativity and diversifying the way our future youths think and create. Sergio also practices Architecture full time at a local firm in downtown Los Angeles, called Omgivning. Omgivning breathes new value into urban spaces, bringing people together amid warmth and vitality. Having worked in the aviation, commercial, hospitality and residential sector, the greater goal has always been to help create inspiring and meaningful social change through design and creative problem solving.