WITH GLOBAL CHALLENGES COME AWESOME OPPORTUNITIES FOR GROWTH AND CHANGE. THE TIME IS NOW TO INVEST IN
MARGINALIZED COMMUNITIES, STUDENTS, AND THE CREATIVE ECONOMY.

FORWARD

Following a strong Fall chapter we were once again faced with another districtwide shutdown. Fortunately, we were able to quickly adapt programs and classes to teach remotely like we did at the beginning of the school year. At the start of February all schools started back with in person classes and we’ve been moving ahead strong ever since. This second half of the year will be geared towards refining our production classes and bolstering our after school programming and program partnerships. The emphasis of after school programming will be on sports media through our partnerships with the UTC athletic program, Chattanooga Football Club, and local school athletic programs. These are the sorts of program opportunities that allow for advance skills application for the students and a direct path to career opportunities.

As was mentioned in our Fall Impact Report, we completed our new teaching studio at the Tivoli Center. This space has allowed to work closely with our mentorship cohort and give them top tier experiences with industry professionals. From this space we’ve also been able to bring major opportunities to Chattanooga including recording music for Drake, Rhianna, Universal Music Group, Warner Music, Nice Work, and Justin Bieber.

Impact Report Highlights:

• Mentorship Cohort Programming

• Middle School Programming

• High School Programming

• Extra Curricular Programming

• Professional Opportunities and Local Chattanooga Musicians

• Partnership update with the YFD and Our Highland Park/East Lake Partner Production Studio

IMPACT THROUGH MENTORSHIP

Our mentorship programming is the most refined model we follow to impact students. Through this model, a very small select group of students are offered the chance to work within our production studio multiple times a week and in many cases even get paid. Here is where we pour everything we have to offer into our students. This is also where students are paired with a small group of mentors that work with them on a regular basis. These mentors are in communication with parents, teachers, and other stakeholders in the students’ lives so that we can holistically impact their lives. These mentors include grammy nominated, multi platinum record selling, major label producers in addition to widely recognized published content creators.

Through intentional small group impact, our students lives are being changed. We’ve even seen dramatic improvement in each students grades.

WATCH THE VIDEO BELOW TO HEAR FROM OUR MENTORSHIP STUDENTS!

*** ALL CONTENT PRESENTED BELOW WAS CREATED BY HowarD Connect Academy Students and HOWARD HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS ***

Middle School Programming at The Howard Connect Academy

All programming falls in line with the focus of our previous programming in empowering students by equipping them with skills and technology through modern creative industries found within the music industry: Music Production, Audio Engineering, Photography, Videography, and Design.

Through our middle school partnership, we are teaching three production classes per day in addition to supporting a small-group home room class. In addition to our regularly scheduled classes, we’ve also integrated production programs within core content subjects as well; specifically two Social Studies classrooms and one Science classroom.

USING LIGHTS AND COLOR FILTERS

One our favorite in class projects is the Pop Up Photo Challenge. For these challenges, students are given a series of photos that they then have to recreate. In this example, students were provided three photos created by photographer Jaren Lewis. They needed to use color filters and studio lights to achieve that look.

Checkout their work below!

The Content for Good Project

The Content for Good Project is our flagship media program at the Connect Academy. Through this program we use media and content creation to showcase the GOOD in the immediately surrounding neighborhood and the Connect Academy. By showcasing the GOOD in our community, we can combat the negative perception people have of this vibrant community!

High School Programming at The Howard School

All programming falls in line with the focus of our previous programming in empowering students by equipping them with skills and technology through modern creative industries found within the music industry: Music Production, Audio Engineering, Photography, Videography, and Design.

Through our high school partnership, we are working in three different art classes per day in addition to supporting smaller one-off projects with various CTE classes and one band class. In addition to our regularly scheduled classes, we’ve also integrated production programs into school wide support initiatives highlighting student and teacher work.

IMPACT OF COVID

Unfortunately, covid has created an inconsistency in the students’ work with some of them working from home and some being in school. The students in school have an advantage because they are able to use the equipment in class while the students at home are limited to their cell phone cameras. However, we are thinking of ways to give them the opportunity to produce content with our equipment during after school programming and athletic events. Virtual students still have the opportunity to learn how to edit photos and produce music. This virus has significantly impacted the number of students we are able to work with at the high school side. In-person class sizes have been reduced by 50-60%.

Additionally, COVID has significantly reduced the number of students and teachers we were hoping to impact this school year. Depending on your perspective, this could be a good or bad thing… Bad if you want huge numbers of impact. GOOD if you want more intentional and meaningful impact with a smaller (but still large) number of students and teachers. We are an organization that always chooses the glass half full approach, so we are leaning into the “more intentional and meaningful impact with a smaller (but still large) number of students and teachers” approach. At present, we are still on track to impact around 500 students this school year.

WHAT THE TEACHERS AND STUDENTS ARE SAYING

NEW OPPORTUNITIES, STUDIOS, AND PARTNERSHIPS

DYNAMO STUDIOS HQ

OUR EDUCATION BASED RECORDING STUDIO AT THE TIVOLI THEATRE

Our recording studio at the Tivoli (Dynamo HQ) has taken off over the past four months. This space is still our temporary home as we gear up to find and (hopefully fund) a more permanent space in the future. As it stands, we will be able to occupy this space through most of 2021 right up to when renovations start on the new Tivoli Center. We will be looking for space between 1,000 and 2,000 sqft.

Over the past few months we’ve hosted grammy nominated multi platinum recording producers, major label artists, and a plethora of local Indie artists — All of which allowed for students to play pivotal roles in the production of their professional projects. We’ve created music for Drake, Rihanna, Justin Bieber, Mon Rovia, Johnny Balik, Warner Music, Sony Records, Universal Music Group, Rocnation, S10 Entertainment, and Nice Work. Through this work, we are hopeful that we can begin generating additional funding for our edu programs via royalties from streaming and song sales once this music is released by the artists.

Additionally, Dynamo HQ has become the home/work space for a variety of professional media producers. They make use of our space so they have a professional and creative environment to work in and also have access to our computers and production gear.

THE CITY OF CHATTANOOGA DEPARTMENT OF YOUTH AND FAMILY DEVELOPMENT STUDIOS AND PRODUCTION SPACE

This year has been chaotic to say the very least, but there have been some opportunities offered to us that have kept the fire strong. A few months back Mark Thomas, one of the directors for the Youth and Family Development Department within the local Rec Centers, approached me about refurbishing what used to be an old office space. The goal here is to turn these spaces into a recording studio/media production studio hybrid. This space was formerly the offices of the Parks & Rec department before they moved to a new location years ago. Since then, the space has sat vacant and fallen into a bit of ruin. Now that we have a new roof on the building, we are ready to roll!

Over the shut down season resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic, we were able to meet with Mark and begin mapping out what we were both dreaming up: An easily accessible production space built just for the students living the surrounding neighborhoods. This space is, more or less, a blank canvas for us to build the perfect space for the kids.

What really sold us on this project were two things:

1. The location is in close proximity to a huge number of inner city students. Accessibility and transportation are serious challenges for the students we like to work with and this location solves both of those problems!

2. This space is the perfect gathering space for musicians to come work with students so they can play an active role in their lives. When artists invest their time and energy into working with students is when the real, life changing magic happens.

Here are a few photos from a recent consult with our good friend Matt Jeffrey. His company, Chattanooga Floor Care and Sanitizing, is going support us by staining and polishing our concrete floors!