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Tacoma School of the Arts
Location
Tacoma, Washington, USA
Information
Type	Visual and Performing Arts School
Established	2001
School district	Tacoma Public Schools
Principal	Jon Ketler Paul Kelly
Enrollment	Roughly 60% of applicants
Number of students	450 max (20% out of district)
Website	tsota.org

The Tacoma School of the Arts (SOTA or TSOTA) is the only arts school in the greater Tacoma, Washington area. It prides itself with its community incorporation, and location in Tacoma's up and coming urban core. SOTA accepts students for their last three years of high school only. Students must complete the 9th grade at another high school. SOTA's student capacity is 450 students, a number which the school reached by 2007.^[1] SOTA was established in the fall of 2001, with help from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.^[2] Classes are housed in multiple venues across downtown Tacoma, in buildings that have historically served many purposes—including a department store, a music store, and a dance studio.^[3]

Students

SOTA tries to allow students to foster responsibility. To this goal, many SOTA projects are student-run, including some aspects of the school's administration.

Many Performing Arts projects are left up to students. Students have directed theatrical productions including The Glass Menagerie (dir. Kathryn Robinson, 2007) and The Last of the Darling Brent Girls, the latter also written by a student (dir. Kaylie Rainer, written by Roland C. Carette-Meyers, 2007).^[5] All productions, most directed by teachers, star only SOTA students—exceptions are rare, such as The Trojan Women casting a very young non-student in the silent role of the toddler Astyanax (performed in autumn 2007).

While students are expected to take a wide variety of classes, most specialize in one department, or "discipline". Departments offered include those of the Visual Arts (photography, sculpture, graphic design, film, drawing, and painting) and those of the Performing Arts (songwriting and audio recording, instrumental music conservatory, vocal music, dance, and technical theatre). Some students may announce a "renaissance" major where they take classes from all the disciplines. SOTA does not receive any funding to teach acting, due to the district's perception that the employment rate for actors is too low to justify training them.^[6] However, there is an Actor's Studio class at SOTA, and students perform in all of these theatrical productions as well as many of the film productions.

Admissions Process

Students apply during their freshman year of high school. The School accepts 115 in-district students and 35 out-of-district students. Students first attend an information night during the fall or early winter. At the information night they schedule an appointment for a "community interview." At the interview students are interviewed by a SOTA student, a community member and a parent of a student. They must provide their portfolio and all of it's contents at the interview.

Faculty and Staff

SOTA teachers are some of the best in the area. They are passionate about their subjects, and are able to teach students a variety of subjects in some non-traditional ways. Examples include a class planned to premiere in fall 2008, Humanities Through Movement, to combine the teaching of the English language, American History, and modern dance.

Local artists are also hired by the school to teach their art forms. Included in this innovative "Artist in Residence" program are the Audio Recording and Jazz Combo classes. Many of these adjunct artists teach only part-time, though some teach full-time.

J-term

J-term is a period in January between 1st and 2nd semester. During this time, instead of going to regular classes, students can attend a month-long class or various internships arranged by the school. Some students plan to go on service trips instead of internships. Previous service trips have included China, Mexico, and India. Sophomores must take a class during J-term.

Daily Life

A typical day at SOTA is not like that of a comprehensive public high school. There are four periods a day, in block periods over the week. Mondays and Wednesdays at SOTA students attend periods 1-4, and on Tuesdays and Thursdays students attend periods 5-8. There are 20 minute passing periods, as classes are held in over 10 different buildings and businesses. Three of these buildings are owned by Tacoma Public Schools and they are all within one square mile. Students use these 20 minutes to take buses and the Tacoma Link light rail to their next class. Some classes are housed in the University of Washington Tacoma, Tacoma Art Museum and the Broadway Center for the Performing Arts. On Fridays, students arrive at 10:45 am for grade-specific activities; sophomores focus on math and science, juniors have writing classes, and seniors have advisory on their culminating projects. Showcases are also held on Fridays, where students perform and present their art in front of their peers.

Academics

The Humanities classes are taught on a 3 year revolving curriculum, so sophomores, juniors and seniors are all placed in the same classes together. SOTA offers all math and science classes that a typical comprehensive high school would offer, except for Advanced Placement classes. Classes are held in the 3 buildings owned and leased by the Tacoma Public Schools, as well as the UW Tacoma campus.

MPG

MPGs, or Mentor Project Groups, are groups to which students are assigned in their sophomore year. About 20 students are in each group, along with a "mentor" or staff member. The groups meet on Fridays from 1 to 4, and use the time to work on projects that benefit the school and greater Tacoma community.

FIRST Robotics Competition

In 2008, SOTA created its own FRC team with the help of Team 360 from Bellarmine Preparatory School. They were Team 2557, SOTA Bots, with the robot they created known fondly as the SOTA Bot. The SOTA Bot came in second and won Rookie of the Year in the FIRST Microsoft Seattle Regional^[7] and went on to get 22nd place in their division in the Atlanta International Competition.^[8]

Notable people

SOTA students make frequent use of the Link to get from class to class, across Downtown Tacoma

In popular culture

Several SOTA buildings were used in the film 10 Things I Hate About You; the guitar store in the film is now part of the SOTA music department, as well as Club SOTA,^[9] an all-ages club hosted by the school.^[10]

Sister Schools

The Tacoma Science and Math Institute, or SAMI, is a school due to open for the 2009-2010 school year. It is the district's other magnet school, with a schedule and concept similar to SOTA.^[11]

External links

• Official SOTA Bot website
• School of the Arts at the Tacoma Public Schools Site

References