Nevada Performance Academy begins enrollment today

The Nevada Performance Academy, a new state-sponsored charter school opening in Carson City in August, begins enrolling students today.

“We’ve been toiling in the background, working to get everything ready in time for our enrollment launch, and now we’re set to go,” said David Papke, the school’s executive director.

“We have our main academic support facility in the approval process, and we’ve put everything together with our community partners.”

The school, which serves grades 7-12, will cap enrollment at 24 students per grade.

A community forum will be 6-8 p.m. Tuesday to provide more information about the school the enrollment process. P

arents of interested students may also enroll online at www.npacharter.org.

Eugene Paslov, the Academy’s governing board president, said arrangements with community partners have been established.

“The original vision of the school was to offer programs in conjunction with Western Nevada College, the Brewery Arts Center and the Carson City Library,” he said. “It’s extremely gratifying to see this vision become a reality.”

The academy, known as NPA, will use online courses, supported with full-time, highly qualified teachers at the school’s main facility.

The school will emphasize the integration of arts into the core curriculum. NPA plans to sponsor a series of extracurricular performance-based activities and classes at its partner sites.

Stephanie Arrigotti, Western Nevada Musical Theatre Company director and professor of music at Western Nevada College, has worked to develop the program for NPA students at WNC.

“It’s a terrific line-up of classes, with the best teachers, and it will fit well with the mission of the school and the flexible schedules of its students,” Arrigotti said.

“The classes range from song writing, to piano, to acting, to voice and choir, to recording techniques, to theater technology, and history of American musical theater and history of rock-’n’-roll.

“When you consider all these classes, the opportunity to get dual credit, concurrent enrollment, and NPA scholarships for WNC fees, it’s a pretty special opportunity for local performance-oriented students.”

John Shelton, executive director of the Brewery Arts Center agrees.

“We’re quite pleased by the development of our partnership with NPA and think students as well as Carson City will benefit,” Shelton said.

“We’re making our entire facility available to the students of NPA, from the theaters and ballroom, to the studios and media arts labs,” he added. “We foresee a vibrant and artistic convergence of teachers and learners blossoming from the partnership with NPA, which fits our mission perfectly.”

Shelton added that the NPA’s use of the Brewery Arts Center will take place primarily on weekday mornings and early afternoons, and done in coordination with center’s existing rental activity.

The program at the Carson City Library is also based on student interest.

“The new @Two Digital Learning Center is a perfect fit for NPA students who want to utilize technology in pursuit of artistic expression and performance,” Papke said.

“There are so many options. The only real limitation is student imagination.”