InnOVATION Arts Academy nurtures the creative spirit in children by:
1. Providing high quality performing arts training;
2. Encouraging the development of individual expression, leadership capacity, teamwork, and dynamic communication skills;
3. Supporting and developing arts professionals; and
4. Showcasing the arts in the community.

InnOVATION Arts Academy is the realization of a vision Dr Mary Joy Nelson has had since she was a student studying Opera at the University of Kentucky. Dr Nelson founded a summer program for children there in 2007 and served as Program Director of the Academy for Creative Excellence from 2007 until 2016. In 2016, with the help of other children's arts supporters, Dr Nelson teamed up with a dynamic board to start InnOVATION Arts Academy in the community of Lexington. InnOVATION Arts fulfills Dr Nelson's vision of engaging children in the arts from the time they begin to walk and talk through the high school years when the students are seeking college opportunities and careers in the arts. Dr Nelson's experience working with children has taught her that when a young person's artistic gifts are nurtured, the child becomes a life-long learner, participator, and appreciator of the arts. InnOVATION Arts began offering classes in August 2016 with a mandate to employ dynamic, professional teaching artists who are advanced in their field to provide performing arts training, to create productions, to conduct workshops, and to nurture the heart of each young artist who enters the program. Under it's "train to perform" model, InnOVATION hosts a beginner program (age 3-7), intermediate program (age 8-14), and two levels of conservatory programming, wherein students learn fundamental skills through incremental curriculum designed to train students to be intelligent, collaborative, and skillful performers. InnOVATION produces up to 5 musicals a season, including summer camps.

• Arts Education/Youth Arts
• Performing Arts

InnOVATION Arts Academy requests $5000 to support the InnOVATION Arts Academy production season 2026-27 (fall 2026 and spring 2027.) InnOVATION provides the Lexington community with poignant storytelling through pre-professional youth musical theatre productions. The performance quality is designed to showcase our highly trained triple threat students in various roles, for a riveting, family-friendly experience for audiences in our community. Each production offers multiple public performances and a day of school shows.
We strive for high production value worthy of our students' intentionally-developed skills. Each of our musical productions includes a full set, costumes for 80+ participants, props, and other production-related assets (theatrical venue, sound and lighting staff, front of house staff, marketing materials, etc.) In fall of 2026, we will produce The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, and in spring 2027, we will produce Beetlejuice (the one-act version designed for family viewing.)
InnOVATION Arts Academy fulfills a special mandate in our community for long-term, academy-based performing arts training. Like a ballet studio, InnOVATION is designed to train students from ages 3 to age 18 to develop into pre-professional performers. Many families are seeking high quality, scholastic performing arts training for their child’s betterment. By propelling our students to grow via growth mindset in an excellence- based program, we create a safe, dynamic place for young artists to develop and spread their wings.
Additionally, we develop students who are creative, independent thinkers; able to lead and contribute to a team. We offer many team-building activities, such group storytelling, and group-devised staging, for example. We also create many student leadership opportunities, including the high school internship program, student creative team positions (student director, etc,) student technical team positions (student stage manager, etc.) Additionally, we strive to offer a welcoming, integrated, individual-needs-based environment for children who are neurodivergent or who have disabilities.
Also similarly to a ballet studio, our production season is offered as a place for our students to showcase their mastery of the skills being developed in classes. All of our students study dance, acting, and singing as a part of their year-round training. InnOVATION's model of training is called TTP: "Train to Perform." Within this model, all of our student trainees work on classes and skill-building for the first 8 weeks of a semester, and then transition to rehearsals and production-related learning for the last 6 weeks of the semester.
The beginner program is designed for students ages 3-7. They study 30 minutes of acting, 30 minutes of choreography (singing and dancing), and 30 minutes of vocal music per week. Additionally, they study technical dance (ballet/jazz and/or tap classes) in order to be a part of productions. Beginners have the opportunity to participate in a featured group in the musical production, and they rehearse an average of 1 hour per week during the rehearsal phase of the season.
The intermediate program is designed for students ages 8-14. Students in this program take 40 minutes of each triple threat discipline. They also study ballet/jazz and tap classes. Intermediate students can audition and receive a role in the musical production.
Students in the Orange Monarch Conservatory are upper elementary and middle school students with burgeoning skills. During these pre-advanced years, students study 40-minutes of each triple threat discipline and 1-3 hours of technical dance per week. Their teachers ensure that they are competent in all basic areas of musical theatre, including stagecraft, basic musical theatre dance steps and terms, 2-part harmonization and early solo vocal skills. These students are part of the company and can participate in fall and spring musicals.
Students in the Blue Monarch Conservatory are advanced upper elementary, middle, and high school students. They study 1 hour of each triple threat discipline per week, and must take at least an hour of technical dance (many of them take up to 4 hours/wk). Their teachers ensure they are studying at a pre-college level in all areas. Typically, they study the most challenging roles in the fall and spring productions, and have developed their triple threat skills over many years of study at InnOVATION. They execute advanced choreography, sing 3 and 4 part harmony, demonstrate strong solo vocals, and are nuanced, compelling individual actors and ensemble storytellers. Students at this level receive guest artist workshops by Broadway, tv/film, and other advanced professionals each year.
Technical theatre students in our program work with technical craftsmen in the areas of costume design, props making, stage management, lighting, and sound in order to support our full-scale productions.

InnOVATION Arts Academy fulfills a special mandate in our community for long-term, academy-based performing arts training. Like a ballet studio, InnOVATION is designed to train students from ages 3 to age 18 to develop into pre-professional performers. Many families are seeking high quality, scholastic, long-term performing arts training for their child’s betterment. By propelling our students to grow through excellence- based learning and a growth mentality teaching environment, we create a safe place for young artists to develop.
InnOVATION's student leadership programs and opportunities help young people determine their areas of gifting in arts and non-arts areas so they can more aptly participate and provide leadership within their school's performing arts programs, and within student leadership organizations within their schools.
InnOVATION provides a welcoming environment for neurodivergent children, children with learning needs, and children with disabilities. We provide a teaching environment for children who need accommodations or a modified learning path in order to succeed. Parents are engaged to verbalize their student's needs, and teachers are provided with strategies and classroom support so that all of our students can succeed and grow.
InnOVATION produces musicals that are family friendly with themes that teach, uplift, and engage conversation. Our musicals are designed to bring families into the theatre to laugh, cry, engage imagination and wonder, and share stories of our human experiences. Our cast are given a chance to share their insights and experiences during the rehearsal process, and each cast members is trained to develop a believable character from their own unique personality and viewpoint.
InnOVATION produces musicals that matter. Our productions historically focus on empathy, compassion, and understanding others. We teach our students to care for the ensemble, team, and story more than they focus on their individual part. While they must be prepared, each individual must be prepared to integrate with others and become a part of a story that is bigger than themselves. Some of our productions engage diverse student populations, such as Once On This Island Jr and The Lion King; some productions allow us to bring musical theatre to unique spaces (ie. Lexington Legends Festival of Lights, Shakespeare in the Park, Porchlight); Our curriculum-to-stage methods teach our students about history and how it impacts society.
Scholarship programs make our program more accessible to lower income families. For example: reduced tuition by application (25% and 50% scholarships,) student full tuition scholarships each year through the Quiana Danyiel Miller scholarship, and Boys for the Arts reduced tuition scholarships (25%, 50%, and 75% reduced tuition.)

Primarily we distribute information about our program on our website: https://www.innovationarts.org. We maintain active social media accounts on Instagram and Facebook. Interested parents/guardians, and patrons can join an email list available both on our website and uploaded from registrants (currently over 2000 emails.) We also have distributed information about our programs periodically to schools, placed ads in school musical theatre programs, and placed our events on listings and events pages in Lexington. We have attended summer camp fairs, after-school-program fairs, and been included in after-school activity directories. Our students perform in many public venues and community events. Finally, we have auditioned students right at their schools for productions and for scholarships. Our program has strong parental involvement and support, and our studio community is very excited about what we do, which means a lot (75%) of our students come to the program by word of mouth.

Our musical productions' target audience is families and children. We aim to provide an uplifting, riveting, family-friendly theatrical experience for each patron that experiences our productions. We target audiences full of children through our school show program.
Our program serves children ages 3-18. We seek to engage students who wish to experience the performing arts at varying levels of participation. Students who are trying out performing arts classes and performances typically choose the beginner and intermediate program options. Students who wish to become highly skilled performers that participate festivals, competitions, and advanced productions typically train in the intermediate program for two years and then receive an invitation to participate in either the junior conservatory (Orange Monarch) or the advanced conservatory (Blue Monarch) programs.

The principal of inclusion is included in InnOVATION Arts Academy’s values statement as one of our most foundational values. We offer an inclusive environment by valuing every student exactly how they present themselves, and communicating to and about them in a manner that expresses their uniqueness, worth, and ability. We hope to see a fully diverse community of students at InnOVATION, and we teach our students to be welcoming and to engage new students through empathy training in our acting exercises, expectations of kindness and respect for others in our studio rules, and through teacher modeling. Our students work with many different teachers from many different backgrounds. We have made the goal of raising $5000 for scholarship support in order to see more children participate. InnOVATION staff must show shared values before being hired, and being inclusive, understanding, and able to adjust to each student’s unique needs is a quality we hire, and discuss on an ongoing basis.

We have a strong partnership with Antagonist Productions, who provides technical support (such as set building, or providing stage management, costume support, etc). Antagonist also engages InnOVATION students in their pre-show entertainment each summer during Shakespeare in the Park. InnOVATION will perform at Gatton Park as part of Antagonist's community event "Porchlight" on August 14, 2026. Antagonist has also provided rental of their class space during times when InnOVATION did not have another venue option.

InnOVATIOn has strong ties to the University of Kentucky. Our founder and Executive Director, Dr Mary Joy Nelson, worked at the university for 10 years as the Director of the Academy for Creative Excellence, under UK Opera Theatre. The university provides us with an excellent performance venue and professional technical staff for our production season each year. On average, two out of three of our productions are performed at the Singletary Center for the Arts Recital Hall. SCFA includes InnOVATION events on their website and email lists, allowing us to broaden our production advertising to the broader university and to the SCFA patron community.

InnOVATION has a strong partnership with Fayette County Public Schools, with the Catholic school system, and with Lexington Christian Academy. Our leaders have presented workshops for FCPS teachers during their arts training days. Our "start a musical in your school" free consultation program has been utilized by many public and private schools to take stock and get resources in place to begin offering musical theatre productions at their schools. We also offer the "Show in a Box," which allows schools to rent an entire show (costumes, props, set) for a low price from InnOVATION. School production partnerships allow for free lending of costumes and props between InnOVATION and the partner school.

InnOVATION also has a strong relationship with one of our music directors, Michael Preacely, who is the director of Uniting Voices Lexington. His choir has a mandate to make choral singing accessible to all communities of children in Lexington and he and his wife LeTicia have been wonderful advisors and community partners in helping to grow InnOVATION’s scholarship program through fundraising. (LeTicia is the parent leader for our parent fundraising team.) We are making plans to do a joint project with Uniting Voices in the future.

Our project goals for the 2026-27 season of productions are: Artistic and Technical Production Excellence, Broadening Community Engagement through Branding and Publicity, and Building Stronger Community Connections
Goal: Enhance artistic reputation, grow our audience base, and demonstrate community relevance through engaging, wholesome, and technically inventive performances.
Actions: Continue to choose productions that engage families, promote wholesome values, and excite potential theatre-goers. Engage new technical artists and materials to create inventive, visually-engaging, high-quality production value. Broaden school show and reduced student tickets programs. Build community partnerships in sync with production goals and themes. Build visibility and grow our audience base through greater community exposure via social media and community performances and events. Increase media coverage, and develop strategies for early and effective production advertising and promotion.

Evaluation methods will include: Ticketing metrics, Publicity Tracking, Patron Feedback, and Student and Parent Feedback.

Ticket Metrics/Track Patron Metrics: determine patron metrics, such as ticket type, number of tickets purchased, etc over 3 years.
Ticket Metrics/Increased Audience: track new ticket buyers within the ticketing system with a goal of 25% increase in new ticket buyers within 3 years.
Increased Publicity: increase public marketing by 30% and track engagement whenever possible
Patron Feedback: Allowing patrons/families/schools to offer feedback about their experience at the performance, positive and constructive, whether they would return, recommend, student/child response, etc.
Student and Parent Feedback: Allow InnOVATION families the opportunity to communicate through survey regarding the impact of their student's participation in the fall and/or spring production, and to report on their experience as an audience member.

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