“Having personally viewed Streetside in the classroom, I believe it is a wonderful program that brings not only knowledge, but joy and deep levels of engagement.”

— Susan Stauter, Artistic Director, San Francisco Unified School District

ABOUT US

Streetside Stories is a San Francisco Bay Area nonprofit that teaches storytelling through writing, the arts, and technology. Our programs encourage young people to draw on their own experiences for inspiration. As they share their true stories, students begin to see new possibilities for their lives in and out of school.

Our History
Eighteen years ago, brothers Seth and James Levy kicked off the first of two cross-country “Rides for Reading.” To promote reading and writing, they rode their bicycles cross-country, sharing storytelling, theater, and creative writing with groups of youth along the way. After their second ride, the brothers moved to San Francisco. They established Streetside Stories in San Francisco in 1990 and began offering Streetside’s flagship program, the Storytelling Exchange, in San Francisco public school classrooms. During that first year, Streetside served 60 students in three schools.

Since then, Streetside has helped over 12,000 students engage with learning by sharing their life stories.  We offer
high-quality literacy arts education programs to schools and after school programs, community-based organizations and to educators. While Streetside services are available to a broad array of schools and community organizations, we focus our resources on reaching underserved young people who attend struggling schools.  

We serve young people from Kindergarten through 8th grades. In 2005, we expanded our services to East Bay students and teachers. Over the years, we’ve developed seven nationally recognized programs that include:

» The Storytelling Exchange uses storytelling and theater to inspire 6th graders to tell their own stories and build lasting literacy skills.

» Streetside Community Programs brings theater, storytelling and literacy into the after school hours, helping students from elementary to high school to write, share and perform their personal stories.

» Tech Tales is a media arts and literacy program that helps middle school students write stories about their lives, then transform them into short movies.

» Teachers Edge is a collaboration between Streetside and Aspire Public Schools helping 5th-8th grade teachers integrate digital storytelling into their own classrooms.

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