2007 VSA arts Institute Faculty

Deborah Brzoska

Deborah Brzoska is a nationally recognized leader in arts education who has worked with teachers, school districts and arts organizations in more than forty states on interdisciplinary learning and arts assessment. She was the founding principal of an award-winning arts-centered public school and has been a school designer for the Small Schools Project, funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Recently, Ms. Brzoska led arts curriculum, professional development and research efforts for the state of Hawaii and she has written about arts education for The Kennedy Center, the national Arts Education Partnership and The College Board.

Hilary Easton

Hilary Easton is an arts education consultant, evaluator, and professional developer of teaching artists for numerous organizations both within New York City and nationally, working with organizations such as the New York Philharmonics School Partnership Program, the 92nd Street Ys Educational Outreach Program, Arts 4 Learning/Miami, the Delaware Institute for the Arts and Education, and Arts Horizons. Ms. Easton has taught at colleges and universities including Princeton University, Connecticut College, New York Universitys Tisch School of the Arts, and the University of Montana. She has been published in the Teaching Artist Journal: The Purpose of Partnerships: An Outline of Benefits and Shortcomings, and Publishing Musical Compositions in the Classroom: The Writers Process at Work in a Teacher/Teaching Artist Collaboration.From1998-2006, she was a professional developer for the teaching artists at Lincoln Center Institute for the Arts in Education: guiding them in their work with students, and working with associated Institutes nationally. She was instrumental in the development Lincoln Center Institutes Focus School and Higher Education Collaborative program, and for many years a highly respected LCI teaching artist. Ms. Easton is a dancer and choreographer whose work has been presented at American Dance Festival, The Danspace Project at St. Marks Church, the University of Texas, Lincoln Center, and Central Park Summerstage. She has received awards including The Paul Taylor Fellowship, and grants from organizations such as the Mertz Gilmore Foundation, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and the Jerome Foundation. She holds an MFA from New York University Tisch School of the Arts. Ms. Easton has been a member of the VSA Institute Faculty since 2002.

Russell Granet

Russell Granet is the Director of Professional Development and Peer Exchange at the NYC Center for Arts Education. Russell is the former Director of Education at The American Place Theatre and worked as a Senior Teaching Artist for the Creative Arts Team’s special needs program, Special Express. He is currently an adjunct professor at the City University of New York and since 1995 has been teaching a three part, graduate level course on special education and the arts for New York University’s Program in Educational Theatre. He has been an arts education consultant for more than fifteen years on the East and West Coast and has worked with both public and independent schools. He has served as an arts panelist, commencement and keynote speaker, and conference presenter at local and national conferences on arts education partnerships, evaluation and assessment and artist training in arts education. He was a founding board member of the NYC Arts in Education Roundtable and currently serves on the board of the American Place Theatre and is the Art Education Chair of the Columbia County (NY) Council for the Arts Board. He is a graduate of Emerson College, the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art, and holds an M.A. in Educational Theatre from New York University.

Christine Morano Magee

Christine Morano Magee joined VSA arts in January 2007 as the Director of Education Services. Ms Magee’s first career was as a textile conservator and researcher at the Smithsonian Institution Museum of American History. Prior to beginning at VSA arts, Ms. Magee was an educational consultant in the area of arts-based education curriculum development and student advocacy, was an adjunct professor at The George Washington University in the Department of Special Education, and was an elementary and middle school art educator and curriculum developer for 18 years. Ms. Magee also co-founded the Greater Washington, D.C. Chapter of Operation Smile, a non-profit organization which provides reconstructive surgery globally to children in need. She holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Theatre from Mary Baldwin College, a Master of Fine Arts Degree in Theatre from the University of Virginia, a Master’s in Religious Studies from Georgetown University, and is a Doctoral Candidate in Special Education under the Leaders for System Change Grant at The George Washington University. Her dissertation topic investigates studio environments as classrooms.

James E. Modrick

James E. Modrick is responsible for the strategic development of VSA arts programmatic efforts including the development and dissemination of model educational resources using arts-based learning to promote effective integration of the arts in teaching, professional development for artists with disabilities, and promotion of an outcomes-based evaluation agenda to reinforce these model initiatives. This also includes oversight and administration of services to VSA arts affiliate organizations. Mr. Modrick brings a professional background in the arts and arts education. Before joining VSA arts, he worked with the National Art Education Association and the National Office for Arts Accreditation in Higher Education. He completed the Education Policy Fellowship Program with the Institute for Educational Leadership in 2002, received the Young Writer Award for 1998 from Arts Education Policy Review, and was the recipient of an Arts Administration Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts in 1994. He has an M.A. in Arts Administration from Indiana University.

Deborah Stuart

Gordon Sasaki Deborah Stuart has had wide ranging experience with the arts and education. A specialist in children’s music and folklore, she has worked for the past forty years with students and educators in schools across the US, in Central and South America, and in Europe, both as a residency artist and as a teacher trainer. Her training primarily focuses on the integration of music as well as other art forms into the classroom curriculum with particular emphasis on meeting the needs of all learners through arts-based approaches. In addition she works with art and music specialists to facilitate the inclusion of students with different learning needs into their classrooms.

For thirty years a member of the NH State Council on the Arts Artist Roster, Deborah performs with the folk music groups Home for Dinner and Colburn and Stuart, which included a month long tour of the former Soviet Union as well as venues throughout the US and overseas. Her numerous school residencies have taken her from New England to Alaska, Florida and Great Britain.

As an arts administrator, Deborah was for ten years the Executive Director of VSA arts of NH and then was President and CEO of VSA arts in Washington, DC. Deborah is the editor and contributing writer for the VSA arts early childhood resource book Start with the Arts. She also is the author of the companion parent book Start with the Arts at Home. She designed and edited a series of books for use by teachers and youth workers which support creative writing, poetry writing and journaling in inclusive settings.

As a speaker and presenter, Deborah has participated in many conferences, institutes and workshops throughout the country. She was Assistant Director and Instructor of Record at several colleges and universities for The Vermont Institute for Teaching the Arts, a Lincoln Center Aesthetic Education modeled project.

Deborah was awarded the New Hampshire Governor’s Arts Award for Distinguished Arts Leadership for her work in using the arts as an effective tool for including students with disabilities in classrooms and communities.