Indian Hill School District Celebrates the Performing Arts

By Mary Casey-Sturk, Indian Hill Living Editor

In the audience: parents, grandparents, and siblings are waiting anxiously for the curtain to open.  Behind the curtain: butterflies in stomachs, last-minute costume glitches, and anticipation is running high. It’s showtime!

Cincinnati has a rich performing arts tradition. On any given weekend, you can find a variety of plays, musicals, and performances to choose from. From the Broadway Series at the Aronoff Center to local productions, we’re a community that appreciates the arts.  Cincinnati’s May Festival was founded in 1873 and the Symphony in 1895. Many have launched their careers after studying at The University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, having fallen in love with performing at their local school.

The Importance of Arts

The Arts Education Partnership (AEP) is a national network of more than 200 organizations dedicated to advancing arts education.  AEP (a non-profit) shared the importance of an arts education:

The arts have a significant impact on a student’s understanding of their identity and culture:

• Self-concept and identity: Inclusive theatre education programs can provide safe spaces for young people to explore who they students find their personal identity in conflict with others, while discussing their personal visual artwork, English learners increase their listening, writing and speaking skills.
• Cultural heritage: Students are better able to connect with their own cultural heritage through a wide array of culturally responsive music and improvisational opportunities, while dance mentorship leads to a stronger affiliation with the social fabric of one’s community.
• Perseverance: Theatre directly helps students become agents of change in their lives, while students involved in music lessons surpass their peers on tasks measuring perseverance.

Music, visual arts, theatre and dance each contribute a great deal to the development of a variety of skills by students:

• Learning skills: Students who engage with visual arts make positive gains in critical thinking skills, while theatre strategies not only actively engage students in their learning process, but also offer additional pathways to assess learning.
• Motor skills: Music instruction helps develop the parts of the brain associated with sensory and motor function, while engaging in dance education programming during early childhood positively influences a child’s physical development.
• Early development: Children in early childhood education programs who received dance instruction made notable gains in language acquisition, while there is also a correlation between visual arts training and awareness of spoken language in young readers.

The Sue Harder Memorial Performing Arts Center

The Indian Hill School District celebrated the official opening of the newly renovated Sue Harder Memorial Performing Arts Center with a ribbon cutting on Saturday, December 9, 2023. The space that now serves at the entry to the Indian Hill High School auditorium was packed with members of the community, invited to share in the celebration.

“Tonight, we open the doors to unparalleled experiences in the arts to our students, our families, and our community,” Indian Hill School District CEO/Superintendent Kirk Koennecke said during the presentation. “We do so with the elite selection by Disney – as the only high school in the state of Ohio to present Frozen – and we do so in memory of a member of our Brave Family who worked tirelessly as a champion of the arts – Sue Harder.”

“The wisdom of Mrs. Harder is with us tonight through her words, ‘Everyone needs to be needed.’ Everyone does need to be needed. And, here in our district – our Home – we need for each of our students to know they are needed, through song, through dance, through stage management, through instrumental music, through costume design, through set creation and visual arts, through communication of our story that is so uniquely Indian Hill. You have helped to create a space where that can happen, for them. You have risen to the challenge of providing the best to our children. And, as always, in service to our children, I want to say thank you.”

In April 2023, the Indian Hill Foundation accepted the first-of-its-kind generous gift to benefit the students in the Indian Hill School District, granting naming rights to the Sue Harder Memorial Performing Arts Center. Sue Harder was a longtime, dedicated volunteer to the district. She gave her time to the Booster Board and supported the theater and musical arts programs while her two children were attending Indian Hill Schools from 1998 up until 2015. She was also involved with the Boy Scouts, After Prom, and varsity sports teams. Sadly and tragically, Sue passed away from a sudden illness on January 11, 2021. Indian Hill Foundation President Lisa Consolino presented the Harder family with a special framed photo of the new Sue Harder Memorial Performing Arts Center.

“We want to offer a sincere message of thanks to the Harder family for this generous gift that will impact our students for generations to come,” said Consolino. “Sue’s spirit of giving back will continue to live and have a positive impact on our entire school community.”

Indian Hill Living Magazine spoke with Amy T. Clark, District Arts and Activities Director, about the importance of arts in education.

IHL: How exposure and/or participation in the arts can have a lifelong influence?

Clark: “The arts” is such a broad term! Performing, digital, visual, even those are broad! The arts are everywhere! Specifically, at Indian Hill, we have such a vast array of artistic options for our students K-12. Our students start with general music and visual art classes in their early years of development, and that is where the foundation of a love and passion for the arts begins. As they enter the elementary grades and beyond, they are exposed to different kinds of visual art, more performing art opportunities, during the school day, and even before school in some cases. When they enter middle school, and student choice in their schedule becomes even more student centered, our students can choose a path that can lead to a lifelong career in an arts field.”

Clark continues, “from media to photography, acting on stage or creating sound for the stage, journalism to the symphony, to sharing a love with their own students for our students who become teachers, the arts can and do impact every aspect of life! Even for our students who don’t go on to an arts specific career path, having an appreciation for the arts can help during job interviews, public speaking, and giving presentations in a board room or courtroom. Our students are ready to take on any challenge or career because of the education they receive at IH, and the arts play a huge role in that!”

IHL: How can the arts programs at your school (particularly performing arts) lift and connect students?

Clark: “Performing arts specifically at Indian Hill lift and connect our students in so many ways” shares Clark, “our students are truly able to be involved in so many aspects of our entire school community. Our students take academically rigorous classes, participate in athletics, and take part in so many various forms of art during their time here. The community that exists within our arts programs is truly unparalleled! Our students learn how to work together in order to have a successful performance.”

“When the time comes for auditions or submitting an application for a stage crew position, often students are competing against one another since only one person can play a specific role at a time or have a specific job as a manager or crew head. This can be very difficult for all involved. But once the roles are assigned, everyone comes together, supporting one another and working together in order to help everything fall into place. The cast all needs to work together to tell the story. The crews need to work together so that all set pieces, scene changes, and light and sound cues can happen at the right time. The pit orchestra (when applicable during a musical) has to work together in order to make the music sound the best it can be. Then the next level of group work begins, where all three of those groups work together. The crew helps the cast, the pit helps the cast, the cast helps the crew, the crew helps the pit, the cast works with the pit. Everything has to be seamless. These students work separately in many ways for months until the final few weeks when everyone comes together and puts all the pieces together. Everyone has a job to do.”

“It does not matter how big or small, our students are there for each other, working hard for and with each other. Students are able to find their niche within the arts community, a place where they belong. Our students want one another and the show or concert to succeed and you FEEL that when you go to a class, to a rehearsal, to a set build, to a cue to cue, to a sitzprobe, and to tech week. You can hear them cheering each other on. You see them helping one another. You watch them each do their part to contribute to the success of the show. It doesn’t matter how big or how small, what grade level, or how long a person has been participating. Our students are there, day in and day out, side by side, putting in the work to make a show, a concert, any of the productions we do during the year. Sometimes it’s a class. Sometimes it’s an extracurricular activity. What they learn in the classroom runs over into what they do after school. Our unparalleled arts program is like no other I have ever been a part of, and it is incredible to watch our students’ passion and joy every day!”