The Kennedy Center opens its doors to thousands of children each year – and hundreds of thousands more step in through ARTSEDGE, our K-12 arts education network.

As America's national center for the performing arts, the Kennedy Center is committed to arts education. For more than 30 years, our Education Department has provided quality arts experiences for students, teachers, families, and the general public in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan community and throughout the nation. Each year, the Kennedy Center Education Department directly serves more than 11 million people, with a focus on Performances and Events for Young People, Families, and Lifelong Learners; Arts and Schools; and Career Development for Teachers, Aspiring Artists and Arts Managers.

Started in 1969 by Roger L. Stevens, the Kennedy Center's founding chairman, the Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival (KCACTF) is a national theater program involving 18,000 students from colleges and universities nationwide which has served as a catalyst in improving the quality of college theater  in the United States. The KCACTF has grown into a network of more than 600 academic institutions throughout the country, where theater departments and student artists showcase their work and receive outside assessment by KCACTF respondents. Each year 8 regional festivals are presented in varying locations throughout the country.  The festival culminates each year in a national springtime festival at the Kennedy Center which showcases selected productions, provides student and faculty artists with training opportunities with theater’s finest practitioners, and rewards selected student artists with second step opportunities through fellowships, scholarships, and residencies.

Cuesheet, our free print performance guides, help kids and teenagers prepare for attending events at the Center (and on the road.) This informational piece, created by Fairfax County Public Schools, illustrates the ways Cuesheets help young people make closer connections to performances and events.

An education reform effort focusing on teachers’ professional learning.