Telling the story of  Texas’ fifth largest public school system, Northside ISD, a district that covers 355 square miles, enrolls almost 82,000 students and includes almost 100 schools, in less than 30 minutes is no easy task.

Fortunately, the District’s Fine Arts Department led by Director James Miculka and 220 students are up to the challenge of telling about San Antonio’s premier school system, also called San Antonio’s ‘Destination District.’

The students will travel to Houston the first weekend of October to showcase Northside ISD at the Texas Association of School Boards/Texas Association of School Administrators (TASB/TASA) annual convention. Longtime Northside Trustee Katie Reed is the outgoing TASB president.   

Outgoing TASB presidents get to showcase their school districts in front of 6,000 school staff and trustees from across Texas. The 28-minute ‘spectacular’ will have some other special guests in the audience, the children’s parents.

Also expected in the audience and “who will personally witness the  ‘Power’ of the students’ creative energy and talents,” says Miculka, will be the Texas gubernatorial candidates who will address the audience after the performance.

The high-energy, fast-paced production will highlight the diversity and cohesiveness as well as the challenges and achievements of Bexar County’s fastest-growing school system.  Student performers will interweave song, dance, music, and the spoken word to tell about Northside through the six Pillars of Character.

The Pillars of Character are traits that are taught in all Northside classrooms and are considered to be the foundation of NISD’s character building curriculum.  The Pillars are caring, citizenship, fairness, respect, responsibility and trustworthiness.

“We have such a wonderful Fine Arts program,” Trustee Reed said. “When I heard they were going to do a performance based on the Pillars, I thought that was so fantastic. I’m so eagerly awaiting this.  Preparing our children to be caring, respectful, and productive citizens in our society is so important to us.”

The students, who are performing were selected following a rigorous audition process, represent different schools from across the district and from different disciplines, from marching band and string orchestra to mariachi and dance.

Six featured students will represent each of the pillars – Caring, Citizenship, Fairness, Respect, Responsibility and Trustworthiness.

Sydnie Stratton, a fifth grader at Leon Springs Elementary, is representing the Pillar of Respect.

“It means a lot to me,” she said. “Now that I’m a part of this, it’s made me think a lot about these pillars.”

“This is the place where NISD will make a statement ,” Fine Arts Director James Miculka said. “This high-voltage performance will let the rest of Texas know what we in NISD believe, namely that fine arts education has a strong place in the overall education of Texas school children.”  Miculka is also the show producer, although he is quick to credit the talents and dedication of the dozen teachers who pulled together and created the show.

Planning, script writing and choreography for the production began months ago, and regular rehearsals began in August. Rehearsals were held twice a week at O’Connor High School. Students were expected to memorize their lines, songs and staging within days so that rehearsals run as quickly and efficiently as possible, Miculka said.

“This is a huge experience for these young performers.  It is a true professional environment in which the students understand what it would be like if they did this for a living,” Miculka said.

Rehearsals have been intense, students say, but they’re thrilled to be able to meet and perform with students from other schools, a rare opportunity in this very large school system.

Veronica Williams, a senior at Clark, said: “They picked the right voices to put together.”

In addition to the performing art production, visual art students will display 120 original pieces of art throughout the George Brown Convention Center during the TASB/TASA Convention.