DPS introducing new arts curriculum created by music legend Dr. Dre

DENVER — A new wave of entrepreneurship is coming to Denver Public Schools.

The district just announced a new education program founded by music legends Dr. Dre and Jimmy Iovine that will be available to students at Manual High School and Denver School of the Arts next fall.

The program blends business and the arts with classes such as Rapid Prototyping and Disruptive Innovation. The district did not elaborate on what is included but said it is “nothing like it has ever seen.”

It only adds to the investment Colorado schools have made in the arts.

In 2010, the state passed the Arts Education for Workforce Development Act, and it really began an intentional push to gets students learning in different ways.

DPS introducing new arts curriculum created by music legend Dr. Dre

Denver7 spent some time at Charles Burrell K-8 in Aurora to see how the district is implementing arts education to a greater degree.

Schools leaders said students use it in their day-to-day learning by engaging with information in different ways.

For example in one class, fourth graders are tasked with creating a public service announcement for a topic of their choice. It’s one of several ways kids incorporate the arts into their everyday learning. The teachers and students Denver7 spoke with said it helps them engage and learn more about themselves in the process.

“Sometimes I’m super, like, shy, so I don’t really share that much, because sometimes I think I’m wrong,” fourth grader Maximus Logan said. “It really makes me be okay if I make mistakes and be like, super confident.”

“I feel like, growing up, we always thought like classrooms have to look a certain way, and it’s nice to see, like, no, it doesn’t,” fourth grade teacher Mayra Gonzalez said. “It’s okay for sometimes the classroom to sound a little loud. That means that kids are talking, they’re learning, they’re collaborating.”

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Aurora Public Schools told Denver7, arts learning is something it is incorporating for all grades — not just younger students.

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