NOTE FROM JOHN BRADEMAS & HARRIET MAYOR FULBRIGHT
President's Committee on the Arts and the Humanities,
Chairman and Executive Director
This Coming Up Taller Awards publication celebrates the creative and constructive accomplishments of America's young people. It highlights the power of the arts and the humanities to help parents give their children a productive and safe start in life. It profiles the ways in which muralists, musicians, writers, theater artists, filmmakers, historians, and many others contribute as teachers, mentors and community-builders to the lives of children and the communities in which they live.
This is the second year of the Coming Up Taller Awards offered by the President's Committee on the Arts and the Humanities in partnership with the National Endowment for the Arts. Through these awards, we seek to showcase cultural excellence and enhance the availability of the arts and the humanities to children from the earliest years through adolescence. Our goal is to focus national attention on concrete examples of the arts and the humanities as they benefit families and communities across America and to support exemplary programs of artists and scholars who work with young people.
In 1999, the President's Committee received 350 nominations for the Coming Up Taller Awards from 47 states and the District of Columbia. This booklet describes the 10 honored programs and lists the 40 semifinalists. To the awardees, we offer our congratulations. To the semifinalists, we recognize your excellence. And to all the artists and scholars working with young people through community programs, we applaud your efforts to educate and inspire children, and to provide them safe havens when they are not in school or at home. Together you are transforming lives and building America's future.
