University Settlement hosted a festive street co-naming celebration on Friday, January 20, 2012. Guests included State Senator Daniel Squadron, Council Member Margaret Chin, Community Board 3 Representatives as well as program participants, staff and many of our Lower East Side neighbors. The morning started off outside with the street sign unveiling and a traditional Lion Dance by White Crane Dance Company. The lions led guests inside for additional performances and refreshments with participants from our Early Childhood Center. In case you missed the celebration, see below for a few articles, images and videos from the morning. continue
It was exciting to read that Obama is supporting increased spending to Head Start - I worked in one briefly 20 years ago, and again now at University Settlement. For me, the benefits seem obvious. What rankles me, is the recent significant cuts to Early Intervention, and the almost constant need to justify program efficacy. It seems that all levels of staff devote increasingly more time to documentation and measurement, taking valuable time away from direct engagement with program participants. We are fortunate as a program to be the recipient of grants, but here too, writing proposals, scaling up, and then reporting deliverables, for smaller amounts, with shorter time spans, means the dance of hoping, requesting, scaling up, reporting back, is an exhausting, labor intense process. continue
There's so much to be thankful for at University Settlement, and last week was no exception! With celebrations taking place in sites from Manhattan to Brooklyn, University Settlement staff, volunteers and program participants shared in the giving spirit and enjoyed a healthy dose of holiday food. If you couldn't make it to all our celebrations – fear not! We've rounded up the best of Thanksgiving at University Settlement this year, so check it out, and share your holiday stories with US. continue
The Panoply Performance Laboratory held the first of five events covering "step one" of the NATURE FETISH project, which we are honored to be developing through residency support with The Performance Project @ University Settlement. A huge thank you to everyone who attended this first event! continue
Last Friday one of our new Artists-In-Residence, the Trusty Side Kick Theater Company, held their first play development workshop with three year olds from our Head Start Program. Trusty Side Kick is developing Shadow Play, an interactive show for 2-5 year olds that will premiere at University Settlement on March 3, 2012. Each workshop Trusty Side Kick leads with our early childhood programs gives the company members rich opportunities to ask themselves and their target audience, "What is it? What are we doing?" continue
For the past 125 years University Settlement has seen continued advances in programming implemented by responsive staff striving to serve the many individuals and families who make up the fabric of the Lower East Side community and beyond; now it's time to blog about it! continue
