Jazmine Guzman de Anda is an 11th grade student at John O'Connell High School. Jazmine is an artist and innovator; she is currently a student in the Construction Lab and is interested in exploring a career in Architecture and Design after high school. Jazmine has served this year as one of the Arts Department's first Arts Equity Interns. During this internship, she has provided feedback and input on arts priorities, policy, budgets and hiring processes. In her role, Jazmine has taken the initative to lead both adult and student virtual spaces, she is a core member of the Arts Equity Committee and is a student facilitator of the SF Arts Community Collaborative.

Adam Coopersmith is a Bay Area native and a graduate of Ruth Asawa School of the Arts. He studied Jazz drums at Newschool For Jazz and Contemporary Music in New York and has toured the US performing in a variety of music groups. He has been teaching for over 18 years and K-5 music in SFUSD elementary schools for the last 8 years (Paul Revere, Hilltop, Monroe, Rosa Parks, Carver, ER Taylor, Tenderloin, Gordon Lau, and Yick Wo). He is the current chair of the SFUSD Arts Equity Committee, which he helped to spearhead in 2020. When Adam approached the Arts Department administration with the idea of a teacher-driven, teacher-facilitated Arts Equity Commitee, it was an idea that not only aligned with the Arts Equity District mission, but it was what the department needed to ensure that teacher voice is heard and that equity-centered ideas are shared and implemented.

Shannon Gerrity's mission is to help people see and know themselves as creators and creative. She is passionate about integrating art into everyday life and learning, as a powerful tool to break constructs and free our authentic voice - to speak questions, experiences, and solutions into the world for the greater good. Shannon was raised in the performing arts and found the darkroom in college. She has taught internationally and nationally, in public and private schools, for adults and children. Shannon is a practicing artist represented at City Art Gallery in San Francisco, a published writer, and a 200-hour Kripalu yoga instructor. Her art prompts and original songs can be viewed on KTVU’s television show, SF Loves Learning. Shannon founded Creative Flow, a service that helps individuals and organizations cultivate creativity, connection, and community through the flow of holistic art making. Shannon's greatest joy is being in a sea of students who are engaging in a messy creative process, awakening to their greatest asset: their magnificently unique self.

Michael Ryther has been with the Arts Department for three years as an Elementary Theater Arts teacher, before that he taught theater arts in Los Angeles – He teaches a highly dynamic and highly engaging theater arts program in which his students learn how to bring stories from the page to the stage. As an SF Loves Learning Musical Contributor since March of 2020, Michael is a singer/songwriter/educator who brings undeniably catchy melodies and smartly crafted lyrics for students of all ages. Michael wrote the songs as students were learning about conservation, eco-systems and exploring while we were in a stay-at-home mandate, he taught what it meant to be caretakers and protectors of the planet, he has designed, executed and created a student centered musical video repertoire to inspire the young viewers to become real world readers, writers, mathematicians, athletes, artists, scientists and critical thinkers. During a time when the world was shut down and many of us could not even figure out what to do from one day to the next, he consistently produced original songs and entertaining videos every week. He brought in friends to help with his projects and brought us all together, making being in lockdown bearable.

Charmaine Shuford is a Social Studies and Language Arts Teacher at Downtown High School. She was named the January 2021 Teacher of the Month by 826 Valencia! Beyond her teaching role at DHS, she has developed curriculum pertaining to school-wide and project-specific themes, facilitated a partnership with the American Conservatory Theater to provide students with an acting coach/director for end of semester exhibitions, engaged her staff in the continuous discourse around school climate and culturally responsive teaching, organized school-wide Black History Month events, redesigned the Acting for Critical Thought project exhibitions by incorporating more student voice and performance, and so much more. She started out in SFUSD as a Paraeducator and has a passion for instructing students in learning STEP to perform in exhibitions, a journey that leads her students in stepping—a style of percussive African American dance involving strong choreographed footfalls, claps, and spoken word. She says stepping was cathartic for her when she was a teenager. Accumulated frustrations are channeled into movement and the charged release of the step offers a meditation on embodiment that offers an empathetic ear to black children.

Jerel Baldomero is a second generation Filipino-American from West Covina, California. He joined SFUSD in Fall 2017 to serve on the African American Achievement & Leadership Initiative (AAALI) in the Superintendent's Office. During the transition to Distance Learning in Spring 2020 Jerel took on the responsibility for programmatic and video editing responsibilities to establish SFUSD's first educational television program, SF Loves Learning. He was asked to do it two weeks before the launch of the show in the Spring of 2020. He quickly joined the team working overtime to produce an hour long episode of SFUSD educational content and has been indispensable to the show ever since. Since then and through the Spring of 2021, he has continued to support and advocate for the arts in the programming. In the Spring of 2021 the show was reduced to thirty minutes, but Jerel pushed to keep the Arts portion. As a leader and team player, he has been indispensable to the show throughout its tenure and an advocate of reaching the audience through the arts because it teaches children that subjects and themes can be presented in more than one way. The arts celebrate multiple perspectives. One of the lessons from this programming is that there are many ways to see and interpret the world.

Freedom Siyam has been the Principal of Balboa High School for four years, after serving as Assistant Principal for two years. Under his leadership, the school has seen an increase in Arts programming as well as thoughtful master schedule planning to ensure more students have access to Arts courses. Additionally, this year Balboa High School has been recognized as a 2021 CA Exemplary Arts Education school by State Superintendent Tony Thurmond. Schools that receive these awards engage students in quality arts education that meet California Arts Standards for Public Schools (Arts Standards) and demonstrate progress on indicators on the California School Dashboard. The awards are designed to celebrate successful efforts to engage students in arts through exposure to a variety of disciplines.

Benjamin Gonzalez Bursey, was born in Tenerife, Canary Islands. Teaching runs in the family; his mom is a teacher, and so is his younger brother too. After finishing La Laguna University, he was fortunate to get his first teaching post at a local state-aided school where he taught for 12 years. In November 2017, he applied for a position in California. He was finally selected to teach in San Francisco. A few weeks later, he was offered a teaching position at Cleveland ES. He has been here for almost three years and loving every minute. Last year, the Arts Coordinator position at Cleveland ES was offered to him. He is a physical education teacher, and has always highly valued subjects such as Art and Music. He stated, “They are essential in the development of a student's personality. And many times, we do not give them the value they deserve. It is essential to promote in teachers and students the wonderful world surrounding the Arts and the infinite possibilities. Sometimes students do not know how to express themselves through words or numbers, but they can with sounds and drawings. By promoting these types of activities, we have discovered hidden abilities in our students. I have been blessed to teach at Cleveland ES and having the opportunity to lead a fantastic team.”

Flora Wong earned her Bachelor of Music in Music Education concentrating in Choral & Keyboard, Master of Education with Special Interest in Music, and Single Subject Teaching Credential at San Francisco State University. She also earned certificates in Kodály pedagogy and Orff pedagogy.

Flora Wong has been a music teacher at San Francisco Unified School District since 2007. She has taught band and chorus in Excelsior Middle School. Being an itinerant music teacher, she has taught general music, chorus and instrumental music at various elementary schools, including Chinese Immersion School at De Avila, Sunset Elementary School, Edwin and Anita Lee Newcomer School, Spring Valley Elementary School, Redding Elementary School, Rooftop PK-8 School, etc. Currently, she is teaching Orchestra and Piano classes, and is the Arts Coordinator at Francisco Middle School.

She is honored to be part of SF Loves Learning. She likes the idea of creating more educational channels to support students and the community. She enjoys producing music education videos with her own interpretation that goes along the themes and seasons of SF Loves Learning. From planning the content, recording of the music, to post-producing the sound, graphics, animation, subtitles etc., she is excited to explore the use of technology and is grateful to use them in creating these videos. By teaching songs in Cantonese and Mandarin, she supports the bilingual needs of students and the community, which fits one of the goals of SF Loves Learning. She is thrilled to bring music education to the San Francisco students and community.

The Arts Education Alliance of the Bay Area (AEABA, formerly Arts Providers Alliance of San Francisco, APASF) is a group of professional artists and arts organizations and their allies dedicated to the advancement of arts education in the San Francisco Bay Area. AEABA members are all actively engaged in providing children and youth with educational opportunities in the creative arts. The AEABA provides a forum for the exchange of information and ideas among members and the arts education field at large. This year, the SFUSD Arts Department has successfully partnered with AEABA to launch the SFUSD Arts Community Collaborative, a monthly gathering for Arts community-based organizations, teaching artists, arts administrators, teachers, funders, and arts advocates, focused on strengthening San Francisco's arts education ecosystem by aligning our work with intentional interaction, culturally responsive practice, and collective action. Over 100+ members of the San Francisco Arts community have joined in the work of the collaborative this year and we look forward growing this partnership moving forward.

Julie Charles is the Deborah and Kenneth Novack Director of Education at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and an all-around total arts rockstar. This year, Julie has been a hands-on partner working alongside the SFUSD Arts Department to provide at-home art supplies and curriculum materials to students in 3rd-5th grade. Julie leads programs for teacher development as well as student visits to build connections between SFUSD and SFMOMA. Her work, and the work of SFMOMA continues to increase the quality and relevance of curriculum and pedagogy in the arts in SFUSD, at all levels.

Juan Manzo is an arts education professional and advocate with over 15 years of experience in the field. He has led arts education programs and professional development workshops in arts integration for teachers and young people in New York and California. Manzo has worked as a teaching artist and arts education consultant for multiple organizations, including StageWrite, The Old Globe, San Francisco Opera, Young Audiences of the Bay Area, La Jolla Playhouse, and Center Theater Group. As a member of the Board of Directors for the Arts Education Alliance of the Bay Area, he has worked for a stronger and more equitable arts education community in the Bay Area. A strong believer in using the arts for creative engagement and problem solving, he is deeply committed to ensuring access to the arts for all students regardless of socioeconomic status or race. He has been a strong ally and advocate for SFUSD students. Recently, he has been an integral part in leading professional development opportunities in engaging students on Zoom through various theatre techniques. He is also an integral part of the SFUSD Arts Community Collaborative, helping to bridge the vision between SFUSD and our local arts organizations.