VSA arts of Indiana

VSA arts of Indiana (formerly Very Special Arts) is an international, nonprofit organization dedicated to promoting artistic excellence and providing educational opportunities through the arts for children and adults with disabilities. The East Central District Office, which opened in April of 2000, is now located at Hillcroft Services. Programs include teacher in-service training, disability awareness programs, high school prom, artists-in-residency programs at school, art exhibits and festivals, and playgroups. Please feel free to visit our state website at www.vsai.org.
VSA arts of Indiana programs include:

• VSA Festivals: Are annual events where special education students from Muncie and Anderson Community Schools Special Education Co-ops participate in a day filled with music, dance and art activities.
• VSA Festival Fridays: A weekly event of 15 classes of students with disabilities, through a partnership with Delaware/Blackford, Madison-Grant, Liberty-Perry Community Schools Special Education Co-op, have a VSA sponsored artist-in-residence program in their classroom for art, music, dance, and yoga.
• Butterfly Ball: This allows students with special needs from seven area high schools the excitement of comfortably attending a formal dance with their families and the supervision appropriate to their medical needs.
• Caring Arts Program: Provides children with emotional disabilities necessary creative outlets in the form of music, dance, and visual arts for social interaction in a safe environment. Caring Arts also offers a counseling component in partnership with Ball State University Dept. of Counseling Psychology. Meets Saturdays 9am-12pm, 10-week Fall Session, 10-week Spring Session and 1-week Summer Camp.
• Just-Us: A program offered to Henry County court-ordered adolescent females to provide alternative emotional outlets through the arts by providing journaling/writing sessions facilitated by VSA Teaching Artists.
• Young Adult Art: This is a program that allows residents from local group homes and the community to attend sessions with classes in the arts and an opportunity for recreation and socialization. Meets on Fridays, 3-4:30pm.
• Soaring Over Stories: This program brings together young, pre-school and elemntary school-aged children in order to lean about and appreciate literacy and diversity through the arts.
• VSA offers Very Special Spectrum workshops, which provide teacher training workshops on adaptive techniques for the inclusive classroom.
• KidArt: A parent/child "playgroup" session with three 30-minute classes in art, music, and movement. Children are ages 10 months to 5 years. In partnership with Hillcroft Services. Meets Tuesdays 9:30-11am or Wednesdays 6-7:15pm.
• Kids on the Block: A program to provide an educational puppet experience which enlightens all children about disability awareness, medical/educational differences and social concerns.
• Partnership with Roy C. Buley Center: VSA teaching artists offer enrichment classes in readers theater and dance at the Buley Center each week.
• Partnership with Beyond I CAN: VSA has loaned the equipment for Arts for All Wheelchair Painting for the creation of beautiful artwork.

East Central District VSAI's Partner Organizations
Anderson Family YMCA
Anderson University, Department of Kinesiology
Beyond I CAN
BSU-Department of Counseling Psychology
Buley Center
Cancer Center at Ball Memorial Hospital
Delaware & Blackford Co. Special Education Co-op
Delaware Kiwanis
Down Syndrome Indiana
Head Start of Delaware County
Hillcroft Services, Inc.
Isanogel
Madison-Grant Special Education Co-op
Special Olympics of Madison County

For More Information on our East Central VSA arts of Indiana Classes and Programs, please contact:

Sarah Strom

Hillcroft Services, Inc.
4105 N. Walnut St.
Muncie, IN 47303
Phone 765-281-6912
Fax 765-281-6914
Email sstrom@hillcroft.org