Barbra Streisand Donates $10K To St. Paul School
Published: February 7, 2007
Barbra Streisand has donated an unexpected $10,000 to a St. Paul performing arts high school, which says her record label plans to contribute an additional $10,000 worth of audio-visual gear.
The St. Paul Conservatory for Performing Artists, which serves grades 9-12, announced the donations Tuesday. Its executive director, Terry Tofte, said he first learned of the gifts last month, and “my reaction was, ‘Well, Merry Christmas!”‘
Tofte said the school hadn’t had any contact with Streisand’s staff up to that point, and he didn’t know of anybody at the school who had even attended her Oct. 24 concert at the nearby Xcel Energy Center, where tickets fetched up to $450 per seat.
The St. Paul conservatory was one of 14 schools in cities on Streisand’s recent tour that received contributions, said Rupa Balasubramanian, a program associate at the Streisand Foundation, based in Santa Monica, Calif. All 14 focus on arts education, an area Streisand believes is vastly underfunded, Balasubramanian said.
Tofte said the school will create a recording studio with the equipment, and the cash will be used for staff and curriculum development for its new music program.
The conservatory opened for the 2005-06 academic year as a public charter school with a focus on theater and dance. Enrollment has doubled from the initial 150 students.
Streisand’s tour was ranked second-grossing tour in North America last year, generating $92.5 million in gross sales, with an average ticket price of $298.36, according to Pollstar, the industry trade magazine.
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