Words Beats & (my) Life Part IV

It is important to know that community much like success can not just happen in a vacuum. It is not something that just happens in a classroom. Community has to happen in the world. Some organizations create complex rights of passage programs rooted in traditional African writes of passage programs, but hip-hop has its own ways of handing down tradition and recognizing the transitions of members of the community. To that end we organize events for our students to showcase their talent through the performance of songs, routines, and gallery shows. We also bring them into community by having them participate in paint battles where people create murals as part of a competition, dance battles where students in some instances compete against their teachers and slam poetry or MC battles. It is critical that opportunities be created to demonstrate skillset mastery in community.

We invite communities to review portfolios as part of showcases, but invite pioneers and legends from the hip-hop community to witness, challenge and support our students in their efforts as young artists. It is vital that they know that they are part of a long tradition of practitioners, and that they are part of a larger community of local young artists and arts of all ages. That their challenge is to excel and create work that makes them memorable. Peace, love, unity and having fun are as important to hip-hop as any of the art forms, or knowledge of self. It is essential that every student understand and experience that the nature of their community is a participatory one. They can not be an artist that nobody knows or has seen.

We host graffiti street art and fine art paint jams for between 50–75 artists every year, of which 10–15 are our apprentice students. Our students compete in every dance battle we host in an effort to showcase their skills, their innovation on the dance and to be in community with a larger dance community. We convene both of these communities to keep them rich, strong and connected. For our students to be reminded they are being brought into community not for its own sake, but to remind them of their oath, “This world needs more positivity | I take on this responsibility| And promise to use my abilities | I’m full of possibilities”. They have a responsibility to continue to create, innovate and take their place in the larger community as an artist, scholar and eventually a leader. They belong at the center of any cipher. They belong at the front of any boardroom. They are self-confident over achievers who take advantage of every opportunity to learn and showcase their creative brilliance. It is this very spirit we work to cultivate with in the larger community by building what we call Ciphers.