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Health & Fitness

All About TALK by Amy Donne

The Theater & Arts Leadership Kouncil's 1st teen blog. Sophomore Amy Donne describes TALK and embraces some adult realities - deadlines & editors. Here's what Amy Donne says about TALK.

Shows like "The Pitch," where young entrepreneurs learn to pitch their new businesses to big shots with money exemplifies one facet that the Theatre & Arts Leadership Kouncil works with the teens on - professional self-promotion.   Early on teens involved in TALK are taught about "elevator speeches" meaning those speeches where you need to make a positive impression within 30 seconds, as if in a 5 floor elevator ride. TALK teens practiced them at meetings and then with the public at events like our tent displays at the Art & Garden Fair and the French Farmer's Market (Aug 11th is our next one).  In this blog, new TALK Kontributor Amy Donne (a sophomore at HF) is writing it out and along the way, learned how to work within a deadline and with an editor - professional writer and TALK volunteer, Amy Eagle. 

Here's Amy's blog... 

A new organization has sprouted in Homewood. That organization is TALK. If you haven’t heard of TALK yet, without a doubt you will. The mission of the Theatre & Arts Leadership Kouncil Inc. (TALK) is to be a nonprofit organization that teaches leadership and provides a voice for diverse populations though the expressive, transformative, and rejuvenating power of the arts for teens throughout Chicago’s south suburbs.

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TALK’s main purpose is to build teen leaders and  develop a community where art is a “team sport.” TALK is a one-of-a-kind program because it really gets teens involved with whatever type of art that they prefer, whether it’s visual, literary, performing, media or musical. TALK teens use their skills to organize high profile art events. For example, TALK participants debuted some of their work to the citizens of Homewood by painting a mural over night and presenting it to commuters at the Homewood Train Station this past December. Even more recent, TALK had its very own booth at Homewood’s Art and Garden Fair. This booth displayed works of art done by local teens who were trying to raise money for TALK and just get their art out there for people to see.

But TALK isn’t all about work, there are plans for much more, such as rooftop rock concerts and flash mobs. In the long term, TALK has some big goals they’re shooting for. With the guidance of adults like the founder of TALK, Homewood resident Steve Ploum, and many others, TALK with mount a campaign to secure a physical performance and multi-media studio space where teens can nurture their artistic community in after school and weekend programs. In this setting, teens can develop and grow their ideas, plan and organize upcoming events, and receive arts instruction from adult volunteers who are also professional artists. Also under this supervision, teens can see how they do as instructors to pre-teens. This helps bring out a teen’s leadership skills, and as the older kids go off to college and the pre-teens move up, the cycle continues.

Find out what's happening in Homewood-Flossmoorwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Another big goal TALK has is at the end of the summer of 2013, with financial support, TALK hopes to engage teens from all over the south suburbs of Chicago in the state’s only all teen Multi-Media Arts Festival. It will be accompanied by a CD/DVD and a bound book that with feature original, high quality works of art from the teen contributors. TALK is easy to be a part of whether you’re an adult or teen.

You can contribute as little or as much as you like. Adults who want to be more involved can become part of the Senior Leadership Board. From the get-go, TALK was run by the dedicated adults of the Senior Leadership Board. If you’re a teen, you can work to be a part of the YoLK (Youth Leadership Kouncil). YoLK members are elected into their positions and play an important role in setting direction, making decisions, and managing the day- to- day operations of the organization. To get learn more or get involved, visit the TALK website at www.talksouthland.org or call 708.365.TALK. 

 

 

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