About Our Company
My family believed fervently in the power of education.
My mother was a school librarian, my maternal grandmother a history teacher. And I was lucky enough to have teachers who knew that I would need to be secure in who I was - and where I came from - to be able to make it in a world that didn’t value my history or my culture.
Traditional schooling, unfortunately, is not much different today, even in the best schools. Our culture is richer than schools teach us. That is one of the reasons you’ve chosen to homeschool.
Our culture is also deeper than what the media celebrates. Our stars certainly shine bright – Beyonce, Baldwin, Angelou, Ailey – but there are constellations to explore. We have shaped dance and drama, art and architecture, music and more. We have changed what America eats, how it dresses, the language it uses, the buildings it inhabits.
That is why I have developed Creative Curriculum Ventures, so our children don’t just know the stars but explore the galaxies.
About Our President and Founder
Education has been a cornerstone of Willa Taylor’s professional journey. She holds a Master of Education degree in Curriculum and Instruction from Concordia University, a Master of Fine Arts degree in Film Studies from American University, a Certificate in Culinary Arts from Kendall College, and a Bachelor of Liberal Studies from Excelsior University.
In her 30 years as an arts educator she has developed curriculum for students, trained classroom teachers in drama-based instruction, and worked with public libraries nationally to develop arts-based civic projects. Partnering with Disney Theatricals, she developed sustainable musical theatre programs in Chicago elementary schools; created Stage Chemistry, a STEM program that uses performance production to teach physics and math; and established initiatives that use writing, storytelling and creative practices to build capacity for social service organizations.
A published author, she is an adjunct professor at both DePaul and Northern Illinois Universities, Taylor is also an accomplished writer and storyteller. She performs nationally and teaches storytelling across Chicago. She also uses storytelling with businesses, government agencies and community-based organizations to build more collaborative work environments, develop their capacities to engage with their clients/constituents, and better communicate their missions and visions.
Taylor’s contributions have been recognized with numerous awards, including the Arts Advocate Award from Ingenuity, the Exemplar Award from the August Wilson Society, and the Leadership in Community-Based Theatre and Civic Engagement Award from the Association for Theatre in Higher Education.
Willa is a proud US Navy veteran.
