HiStory
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Twenty years ago, a teenaged Sunday School teacher partnered with Oceanside Christian Fellowship’s (OCF) Worship Director to battle a well know nemesis in the world of theatre: the cheesy church drama. Dissatisfied with most of the Christian scripts available for church performances, Rebekah Hellerman and Margy Emmons began writing their own musical productions. OCF Youth Theatre was born. Over the years the program morphed from an alternative Christmas production to a full-fledged youth arts program where kids ages 6-18 had numerous opportunities to explore the arts within the safety of a church environment where directors and choreographers cared deeply for each individual child.
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Each summer, Rebekah would return home from college to direct a musical. OCF Youth Theatre sponsored four successful Summer Theatre Camps, producing well-known family musicals such as Oliver! and Beauty and the Beast, and participating in outreach in inner-city Los Angeles. With its program doubling in numbers in two short years, Rebekah sensed the need for a year round program where youth could participate in the arts in a safe and nurturing environment. Families who had no connection to OCF Church were signing up to participate in camps and productions. Rebekah noticed the impact OCF Youth Theatre had on the youth who participated. Lives were being transformed.
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In 2007, under the guidance of mentors and friends, Rebekah founded Haven Academy of the Arts, a non-profit organization designed to carry on the traditions of OCF Youth Theatre all year long. OCF Church graciously allowed this new non-profit to use its classrooms and auditorium for rehearsals and performances. Haven opened its doors in September 2008 with its first musical production, The Sound of Music. As a small, start up non-profit, the production featured 30 youth from both OCF and the local community. Haven produced three more musicals that first year and offered a K-5 art class.
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After 6 years of establishing successful programming in the South Bay, it was time to expand and do what we had wanted to do since day one: open a tuition-free branch. We knew we wanted to partner with an organization that already had relationships with the populations we hoped to serve, and turned toward First EV Free Church of Los Angeles, with whom we had a history of working pre-incorporation. In September 2014, Haven Pico Union officially opened its doors. Our first show was School House Rock Jr. and was modeled after our South Bay Fall show curriculum. Over the years, our HPU students grew as performers, graduating from KIDS shows to full-length musical theatre reviews and JR. productions. Although arts education in Pico Union was challenging, we felt we had something special at Pico that could be applied to other underserved communities.
Thus, the birth of our hART of the City sub-site, a mobile program that partners with schools, churches, and community facilities throughout Los Angeles to bring our summer theatre camp curriculum to underserved communities. In 2018, we launched our hART sub-site at the Rock Church in the West Adams neighborhood of Downtown Los Angeles. Our hART camps were about more than just serving these communities for 2 weeks at a time; these camps were a strategic way to assess the viability of a second, year-round tuition-free site just like Haven Pico Union. After two years of hART camps, we had found the right partner and began to work internally to meet our goal of opening a second year-round site. Although initially delayed by the pandemic, On September 19th, 2023, after many years of planning and hART camps with our Rock Church and LACS partners, we opened our second year-round, tuition-free site in the West Adams neighborhood of Los Angeles. Today, these three sites (Haven Pico Union, hART of the City, and Haven West Adams) make up our tuition-free LA City Branch of our organization.
Thus, the birth of our hART of the City sub-site, a mobile program that partners with schools, churches, and community facilities throughout Los Angeles to bring our summer theatre camp curriculum to underserved communities. In 2018, we launched our hART sub-site at the Rock Church in the West Adams neighborhood of Downtown Los Angeles. Our hART camps were about more than just serving these communities for 2 weeks at a time; these camps were a strategic way to assess the viability of a second, year-round tuition-free site just like Haven Pico Union. After two years of hART camps, we had found the right partner and began to work internally to meet our goal of opening a second year-round site. Although initially delayed by the pandemic, On September 19th, 2023, after many years of planning and hART camps with our Rock Church and LACS partners, we opened our second year-round, tuition-free site in the West Adams neighborhood of Los Angeles. Today, these three sites (Haven Pico Union, hART of the City, and Haven West Adams) make up our tuition-free LA City Branch of our organization.
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Today Haven Academy of the Arts has produced over 80 musicals and serves over 1,000 students annually. Our South Bay productions range from 40-140 cast members, while our Pico Union branch brings Haven’s after school arts program directly to the under-served youth from the Pico Union neighborhood of inner-city Los Angeles. Our alumni have gone on to be teachers, pastors, nurses, musicians, children’s ministry directors, missionaries, and dentists. We have nurtured incredible leaders who have returned to our program to serve as choreographers, stage managers, administrators, and directors. Haven Academy of the Arts is leaving a legacy with its students, and our students are leaving their own legacy as leaders in the community.
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