Type: After School, Arts, Business

Target audience: Students, Families

Tag words: dance, theatre, painting, drawing, performance, africa, leaders, financial education, rites of passage

The Cultural Arts Program (CAP)

Description: The Cultural Arts Program (CAP) is a comprehensive and sequential arts instruction program offering yearlong after-school and Saturday classes in a range of art forms that is open to all. These classes teach students fundamental skills in dance, music, drama and visual arts to provide them with an avenue for creative expression and a vehicle for self-knowledge. Class levels range from beginner to pre-professional. Classes are offered on Saturdays to 200 students ages 2-24 and adults.

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The Ifetayo Youth Ensemble (IYE)

Description: The Ifetayo Youth Ensemble (IYE) is a pre-professional training and performing program designed for youth aged 11-24 which is dedicated to the emotional and personal growth of youth primarily of African descent, from throughout the Caribbean, Americas and Africa. Youth are stimulated as artists, scholars, and activists by researching and creating new works that address pressing social issues. Research along with interpretation of written texts, peer mentoring sessions, interviews with community leaders, and visits to relevant exhibits and presentations are integral elements of the group’s creative process. The Youth Ensemble meets weekly for training, mentoring, and rehearsal all day Saturday for a total of 8-10 hours per week. Additional activities include research and field trips that take place after-school on weekdays, weekends and on holidays.

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The Sisters in Sisterhood Rites of Passage

Description: The Sisters in Sisterhood Rites of Passage experience focuses on young women ages 8-21. The program ushers girls through the minefield of adolescence, preparing them as puberty rites initiates to reach the point to graduate as confident and focused young women with clear goals and aspirations for their future. The Rites of Passage program leads students through a minimum of a two yearlong process of learning practical information about health and sexuality, building awareness of their cultural heritage, and making connections with a local and international community of women. In addition, the program provides students with a historical and contemporary perspective of global race and gender issues as they relate to young girls and women of African descent.

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I Am My Brother (IAMB)

Description: The I Am My Brother (IAMB) program for boys and young men ages 8 - 21 assists boys and teen brothers transition through adolescence and successfully reach adulthood. Positive role models and mentors in the program are a major source of support to the young brothers and help them reach a point of inner clarity and develop positive self-definition. In a culture where men of African descent are often depicted in the media as perils of society, Ifetayo provides its students with the counter perspective in which black men are leaders, providers, scholars and contributors to a global community.

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The Marcus Garvey Cultural Heritage Program (MGCHP

Description: The Marcus Garvey Cultural Heritage Program (MGCHP) is the foundation of our existence. Designed to offer African people the strongest sense and history of self, Ifetayo’s MGCHP runs year-round and includes a Saturday program as well as special workshops and summer cultural tours. The MGCHP provides historical information about the great cultures of Africa and the cultures of African descendents globally to over 160 youth and 50 parents annually. By learning the language and cultures of the African Diaspora, families develop a sense of connection with the vast and complex history of their ancestors.

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Financial Education Institute (FEI)

Description: Launched in 2006, the Financial Education Institute (FEI)/Individual Development Accounts Program (IDA) for youth and young adults ages 8-30. The FEI/IDA is an extension of Ifetayo’s Rites of Passage Programs which support young people of African descent based in Flatbush, Brooklyn serving borough wide and surrounding communities in their passage from adolescence to adulthood. The Rites of Passage after-school programs provide an educational structure and a nurturing community which build participants’ intellectual and emotional skills, and prepare them to grow into independent, compassionate, self-confident men and women. The creation of the Financial Education Institute (FEI)/Individual Development Accounts Program (IDA) allows the first full integration of financial literacy training into the Rites programming, and addresses a glaring need for knowledge and support in a community where most participants are living below the poverty level, earn low incomes, and have no accumulated wealth through asset development.

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Arts in Education (AIE)

Description: Our Arts in Education (AIE) Program provides instruction in the arts to elementary schools students in the Flatbush and Crown Heights sections of Brooklyn in collaboration with community school boards and the Board of Education. The program's long-term goal is to involve more students at other schools throughout Brooklyn.

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Schools/sites: PS 249, PS 139,

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