History of
The Wooden Floor
“A visionary institution that provides free dance classes to low-income, mostly Hispanic children in Santa Ana. The school now has 400 students and an array of programs to give children a boost. In the early years, Beth Burns, founder and leader of the award-winning The Wooden Floor, then known as Saint Joseph Ballet, was a one-woman show, teaching and raising funds to keep programs free to families. The school has grown from a church basement to a $3.8[sic] million home on Main Street.”
The Orange County Register, April 2004
In 1983, Beth Burns created a summer pilot program for low-income youth to gain self-esteem, self-discipline and a sense of accomplishment through dance.
Then a Sister of Saint Joseph of Orange, Beth wanted to see if young people could find artistic expression as a creative alternative to the drugs, teen pregnancy and delinquency endemic to barrios in Santa Ana, California. The mission remains constant: through arts, academics and family services, youth and their families emerge from cyclical poverty to build healthy and responsible lives.
With an Ahmanson Foundation seed grant of $4000, Beth posted notices at the barrio markets, along with college friend Nageeba Colarossi, who helped for nearly a year. In that summer of 1983, 30 kids came to Saint Joseph Elementary School in Santa Ana’s east-side barrio to dance for six weeks. With 200 attending a concluding recital at the Police Annex, the experiment seemed a success.
Before many gleaned the potential of the arts to engage low-income youth, Beth saw with clarity and determination, an opportunity.
It took time to find available space gratis for dance classes year-round. The Episcopal Messiah Church in downtown Santa Ana, under the leadership of Pastor Brad Karelius, took a risk and offered its basement choir room.
The first auditions for the year-round program were held in January 1984, when students such as Melissa Young joined The Wooden Floor. Twenty years later, a leading dancer with Dallas Black Dance Theatre, Melissa performed with other alumni at The Wooden Floor's Annual Concert, June 1 – 5, 2005, and honored Beth in her final year as Artistic Director.
For many years, Beth taught all the classes and struggled for funding. Some highlights from the early years:
After just a year of service, The Wooden Floor was chosen as one of six quality arts-for-youth organizations in the nation. For this honor, The Wooden Floor competed with 75 organizations in California alone. This Dayton Hudson Foundation initiative awarded SJB a two-year $87,000 grant, creating the DanceFree Weeks outreach program - workshops in elementary and junior high schools - that continue to serve 2,500 youth annually.
In 1988, The Wooden Floor received its first California Arts Council Award, with the highest possible ranking for artistic and administration excellence, to the still under-staffed, underfunded oraganization.
A New Beginning
As the fragile work continued to struggle, Joni and G.T. (Buck) Smith (then President of Chapman College) volunteered to form a new Board of Directors, timely for The Wooden Floor's new independent 501(c)(3) non-profit-organization status. Before 1989, it operated under the non-profit umbrella of the Sisters of Saint Joseph of Orange. In its first six years of thread-bare funding, the organization was able to grow because in lieu of a salary, the Sisters received a token stipend for Beth’s work.
Joni Smith saw new possibilities. She invited philanthropic leaders from Orange County to serve on the new Board of Directors, including Pat Yoder, Judy Threshie, Tricia Nichols, Elizabeth Stahr, the late Marge and Larry Sutton, Stan and the late Carol Chapman, Olga and Fernando Niebla, Betsy and Sandy Sanders, among others.
These leaders embraced a new fiscal philosophy. While The Wooden Floor had balanced its budgets, its precarious position begged attention. The Board instituted a new ‘forward funding’ policy for operating funds to be raised eight months in advance of the fiscal year. This fiscal leadership provided for higher standards for planning and management. This prudent financial management – and forward funding – are in force today, and continue to earn the confidence of donors.
In 1989, Alan Fainbarg, Irving Chase and the Fiesta Market Place Partners in downtown Santa Ana donated 4,000 square feet rent-free, so The Wooden Floor could have its first wood floors, and mirrors large enough for kids to see their arms overhead. The Daniel and Florence Guggenheim Foundation, the late Betty Hutton Williams, Larry Sutton and the City of Santa Ana, led by then Mayor Dan Young, among others, funded the $60,000 tenant improvements at the 4th Street and Spurgeon second-story-over-retail space. Over 10 years, this donated space enabled the work to grow to serve 300 youth annually.
In 1991, The Wooden Floor performed for the first time in the Segerstrom Hall at the Orange County Performing Arts Center with the Pacific Symphony for a Mervyn’s Young People’s Concert.
Creative Collaborations
That same year, The Wooden Floor created a Young Artists Competition for Orange and Los Angeles Counties. Three advisory panels, headed by the late Charles Champlin for Story, Herb Alpert for Music, and Frank Romero for Visual Art, selected youth who would receive $1,000 awards and have their work produced with The Wooden Floor students dancing at Santa Ana College.
Community leader Julia Argyros, a member of the visual arts panel, held The Wooden Floor's first Backstage reception that year – a tradition that has continued and grown through to the present.
In 1993, the James Irvine Foundation funded the first independent impact study of the mission and programs. Ongoing, independent and self-evaluation is a hallmark for The Wooden Floor, see Proven Results.
Also in 1993, The Wooden Floor performed its 10th Anniversary Concert at the Irvine Barclay Theatre on the campus of UC Irvine, California. Thanks to President Doug Rankin, SJB continues its annual performances there.
In 1997, encouraged by Board Member Ginnie Hunsaker, The Wooden Floor transformed its informal homework assistance into a full-fledged tutoring program, and increased its resources and counseling referrals to help more students’ parents. Yet space limitations precluded the further growth of these programs.
New Promise
In 1998, again with the leadership of Rich and Ginnie Hunsaker, the Board of Directors began a capital campaign for a permanent home with room for expanded programs and more students. Led by Capital Campaign Chairs and current Board Members Joan and Don Beall, The Wooden Floor raised over $6 million in 18 months for a first class facility ($4.2 million) and seed endowment (1.8 million) This included a prestigious Kresge Foundation challenge grant of $600,000.
Also in 1998, The Wooden Floor created its College and Advanced Training Scholarship Program to motivate students to go college, by guaranteeing each a college scholarship. To qualify, youth just need to participate in The Wooden Floor all four years of high school and maintain a GPA of at least 2.5. The Wooden Floor's college scholarships are substantial – up to $10,000 a year – for four years.
Since 2005, the College Preparatory and Scholarship Programs has enabled 100% percent of graduates from The Wooden Floor to finish high school on time and go on to college - in contrast with the national average of 36 percent of Latino youth pursuing higher education.
Advanced training scholarships are granted to pre-professional students accepted into certificate programs at Cornish College of the Arts, The Ailey School, North Carolina School of the Arts, or the Joffrey Ballet, among others. Since 1998, six graduates have received Advanced Training Scholarship Awards. Four continue to dance professionally, while one is still in college.
In August 1999 The Wooden Floor moved into its new 21,500 square foot home in Santa Ana’s Museum District. With three large dance studios – Beall, Kennedy and Segerstrom – the Hunsaker Community Center, Betty L. Hutton Education Center and the St. Joseph Health System Volunteer Center, its architecture by McLarand Vasquez Emsiek and Partners, is widely admired.
In October 1999, Eliot Feld brought his New York City Ballet Tech for a week-long residency sponsored by the Irvine Barclay Theatre, again with Barclay President Doug Rankin’s leadership. This began a new tradition enabling youth to work intensely alongside professional performing artists.
In 2001 Beth invited choreographer and improvisational artist Melanie Rios to choreograph two new works for over a hundred students. Succeeding creatively in that challenge, Melanie has collaborated with The Wooden Floor ever since.
In 2004 Founder Beth Burns announced her retirement effective in June 2005. The Board of Directors announced Melanie Rios Glaser as her successor. Beth remains involved as a member of the Board of Directors. Rios Glaser is now Executive & Artistic Director of The Wooden Floor, in which 375 students are enrolled annually.
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