From 2013-2015, I had the good fortune of co-leading the SF High School Rhymer’s Club with Troy Kavanagh. I began visiting Troy’s language arts classes in 2012-2013 because of all the positive energy I heard coming from them. Troy was also enlisting the support of renowned local hip-hop artist, Guadalupe Vargas, known as Perish, to help his students with better understanding the elements of hip-hop and how those elements overlap with poetry and creative writing. The next year we agreed to partner up and form a club. That year, we had Aaron Kalaii host a workshop on art, poetry, and nurturing creativity. You may remember Aaron as he is a Santa Fe area fine artist and musician (he did the artwork for this edition of the SF Reporter in 2013). You can find Aaron’s workshop in the Special Workshops folder below. One thing I was particularly proud of during the first year (2013-2014) was that we released two Zines of student/teacher work.
You Speak Now!
Rhymers-Club-Quarterly-Zine-1-RAlliance
Rhymers-Club-Alliance-RThe following year we were all burned out on Zine making so we focused on poetry workshops. Perish came back for a few return visits to Troy’s class and we also enlisted Michael Blevins, a California area rapper and hip-hop personality, to come and do workshops with the Rhymer’s Club. Additionally, we helped students reach out to local performing arts organizations and some national online organizations whereby they could submit their work to a larger audience. The last year culminated with a large poetry slam that the Club sponsored on the Votech campus outside auditorium. It was all a very good time. It’s proven to much work to organize all the lunch time readings, but I have put Aaron and Michael’s workshops together in a separate area in case folks want to see the work that was done.
Special Workshops
Lunch Time Recordings
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