2024-2025 VocalEssence WITNESS Partner School Agreement 

VocalEssence WITNESS

Thank you for your interest in the VocalEssence WITNESS School Program!

This year, we are delighted to co-present the 2024-25 WITNESS Young People's Concerts in partnership with Northrop, allowing us to expand the reach of the WITNESS School Program to even more schools across Minnesota. Thanks to generous support from our program sponsors, we are pleased to offer you tickets to the Student Matinee: WITNESS Young People's Concert completely free of charge!

As a program partner, your school will also receive access to two free days of classroom workshops with a VocalEssence Teaching Artist, a program orientation with professional development for teachers, access to classroom resources, and a field trip for your students to attend the annual VocalEssence WITNESS Young People’s Concert on Friday, February 21, 2025 at 10:00 AM and 12:00 PM* at Northrop in Minneapolis.
* The 12:00 PM performance will also be livestreamed on the Northrop website.

Note regarding bus reimbursement:
For the VocalEssence Witness student matinee, we are offering free tickets instead of bus reimbursement. If you are facing a financial barrier to securing bussing for the concert, please email matinees@umn.edu and we will be happy to work with you on a case-by-case basis to provide some support.
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This form outlines the terms and conditions of participation in the VocalEssence WITNESS School Program for 2024-2025. You, as the Primary Contact for your school, as well as your principal and/or arts coordinator, should read this agreement carefully and check the boxes, where indicated, to confirm your agreement to the terms of participation. When this confirmation is complete, you will be then be directed to the program registration form to submit information about your school.
 
Name of School

The school agrees to:

  • Have the workshops approved and endorsed by the principal and/or arts coordinator.
  • Provide a primary contact person and a list of other teachers participating in the VocalEssence WITNESS School Program via the VocalEssence WITNESS School Program Registration Form. (Note: you will be directed to the registration form upon submitting this agreement.)
  • Provide the VocalEssence Teaching Artist and students with the necessary physical space and materials for the workshops. For Home Schools, a space will be provided at Northrop for your Teaching Artist workshops to take place.
  • Acknowledge participation in the VocalEssence WITNESS School Program in all publications with the following credit: “The VocalEssence WITNESS School Program is an educational service of VocalEssence. More information at www.vocalessence.org.”
  • Allow participating students and teachers to attend one performance of the Student Matinee: VocalEssence WITNESS Young People’s Concert on Friday, February 21, 2025 at 10:00 AM and 12:00 PM (tickets are FREE for 2024-2025).



Primary contact and all participating teachers agree to:

  • Attend the VocalEssence WITNESS Teacher Orientation Seminar on Saturday, September 28, 2024 (it is important that at least one teacher or administrator attend in order for your school to participate in the program; if no representative(s) attend, we will need to schedule time to bring your teachers up to date on all of the information covered.)
  • Promptly complete additional forms provided by VocalEssence throughout the duration of the 2024-2025 VocalEssence WITNESS School Program
  • Participate in the pre-workshop planning meeting 2-3 weeks prior to the workshop with the VocalEssence Teaching Artist to establish what the artist will teach and what the participating classroom teachers need to do to successfully prepare students for the workshops
  • Prepare students for the workshops and concert by utilizing the classroom resources and worksheet activities
  • Complete any follow-up work requested by the Teaching Artist between workshop visits
  • Distribute and complete the evaluations provided by VocalEssence, including arranging for appropriate district-level permissions to distribute student surveys, as required by your school. Note that student evaluation methods may include opportunities for students to provide feedback through interactive, participatory activities during workshops with VocalEssence Teaching Artists.



In return for your acceptance of these terms, VocalEssence agrees to:

  • Provide two free days of workshops with a VocalEssence Teaching Artist who is compatible with the school’s needs and environment. Note that while schools will have the opportunity to propose their top four artist choices, they may be paired with an artist that falls outside of their preferences due to artist availability.
  • Provide schools with free tickets to attend the WITNESS Young People's Concert
  • Provide schools with classroom resources to engage students throughout the school year
  • Facilitate communication with teachers and VocalEssence Teaching Artists to schedule the workshops and pre-workshop planning meeting at times that work for the school and the VocalEssence Teaching Artist
  • Provide teachers with professional development through VocalEssence WITNESS Teacher Orientation, where teachers learn about the program, our special guest artists and the program's curricular resources, earn up to 3 clock hours of CEU credit, and interact with our roster of VocalEssence Teaching Artists
  • Provide assessment tools to evaluate the workshops

The VocalEssence Teaching Artist will:

  • Participate in the pre-workshop planning meeting
  • Establish a partnership with teachers to present workshops that relate to the VocalEssence WITNESS theme, teacher resource materials, and are appropriate for the specified grade level and school community
  • Have open discussions with the teachers about the workshop goals and objectives, follow-up instruction, assessment, school policies on addressing student behavior
  • Be on time for all meetings and workshops





If this is the same person as the Principal and/or Arts Coordinator, please repeat your name.



By checking the boxes and providing the requested information above, both my principal and/or arts coordinator and I acknowledge our acceptance to the terms and conditions for participation as a 2024-2025 VocalEssence WITNESS Partner School. 

Click "Submit" below and you will be directed to provide registration information about your school.  Thanks!

Contact Information