Hip Hop For Change has earned a reputation in Oakland for its holistic, culturally competent programming. We aim to work with schools who are innovators in the education field who also show a strong commitment to unlocking the hidden potential of underserved students.

HIP HOP EDUCATION

MCing

DJing

Break

Dancing

Graffiti

Knowledge

BRING HIP HOP FOR CHANGE TO YOUR SCHOOL:

Please contact our Education Director Marlon Richardson at: for all education inquiries.

Our ultimate goal is to build long-term partnerships with schools in our community to create opportunities for mentorship and even employment for the youth we serve.

OUR WORK

WHY HIP HOP EDUCATION?

Hip Hop For Change, Inc. has taught over 25,000 students across the nation and the world, from the Bay Area to El Salvador. The goal and objective of our education program is to inspire youth to have a new look at Hip Hop as a vehicle of healthy self-expression and community empowerment, as a means to navigate through the challenges that they are facing.

Our education department is dedicated to providing experiential curriculum that details the history, culture and societal impact of Hip Hop through engaging and interactive presentations. We deeply believe in the power of Hip Hop educational pedagogy as a means to introduce young people to historic and current examples of this culture’s founding principles: peace, love, unity and having fun! By developing curriculums through arts engagement and culturally responsive pedagogy, HH4C empowers Bay Area Black and Brown communities through creativity, while securing employment opportunities in both the arts and nonprofit sectors. HH4C aims to serve vulnerable youth from underrepresented regions of the Bay Area. 90% of the youth we serve are low-income, youth of color. In addition to a plethora of economic and social barriers, these young people lack important connections to their cultural history that have negative effects on their self-esteem, and consequently, their academic performance.

Hip Hop beats have influenced popular music genres from rock to jazz to reggae, however, in many institutions Hip Hop is still not considered a multidisciplinary pedagogy. According to Brown University, culturally responsive teaching has a huge impact on identity and overall academic performance. While the majority of our partnered schools offer music and dance in multiple disciplines, our target demographic still do not receive a curriculum that speaks directly to their cultural upbringing. HH4C arts programming culturally speaks to the values of social justice, social economic struggle, self worth, community, having fun, and more. 

Many Bay Area young people are not getting the expressive outlets needed to deal with daily trauma. As of 2007, only 11% of California schools provided sequential, standards-based instruction in all four Visual and Performing Arts (VAPA) disciplines required by state standards, and 29% offered programs in none. Our Hip Hop curriculum provides students who have been historically cut off from professional development opportunities with relatable mentorship and transferable skills in the arts industry. By providing a Hip Hop lens into their arts practice, HH4C restores the cultural legacy of Hip Hop within the communities from which it came. 

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Our teaching artists serve as positive role models who hail from the same neighborhoods as their students. HH4C programming imparts communication, self-love, and critical thinking skills to vulnerable youth. HH4C offers these young people cultural affirmation and community connections that encourage academic success and personal well-being and responsibility. We provide the youth a safe space to communicate about pressing issues in their communities. Our program is also particularly effective for students with emotional and behavioral disabilities, connecting them to caring mentors and giving them tools to regulate their emotions in creative and healthy ways.

K-13 WORKSHOPS

THE MC: Theory Of Hip Hop Evolution, Music and Culture is a program that provides intensive instruction on all elements of Hip Hop; DJ'ing, Emceeing, Graffiti Art, Breakdancing, and the history and cultural importance of the movement. This experiential workshop empowers youth with understanding and tools for greater self-realization, and with around 21,000 students already having experienced our work in hundreds of workshops, the efficacy of our model is clear. 

EDUCATIONAL

PARTNERSHIPS

In the past, we have created special partnerships with organizations like The Exploratorium, Chabot Space and Science Center, and East Bay Regional Parks District to create unique Hip Hop Programs that use expressive arts to dive into interesting and important subjects from astronomy to zoology. These unique partnerships give our allies new ways to reach their audiences and engage them in using the power of Hip Hop culture in their work.

YOUTH ARTIST DEVELOPMENT

We meet youth artists from all over the Bay Area who have all the talent in the world and all the drive to make their dreams a reality. Programs like our Agents of Change Summer Program connect youth artists with local veterans, closing generational gaps and passing on the knowledge to guide these youth to success with their art. Our next goal with this program is to create a free studio space to allow all youth the means for healthy, positive expression, coupled with training to help them reach the stars.

Donate to support our work in schools!

$10 a month/per year = Guest artist in the classroom

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$30 a month/per year = Workshop in the classroom

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$50 a month/per year = School-wide assembly

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$100 a month/per year  = Full-day workshop at a school

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$250 a month/per year = 6-week workshop at a school

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$500 a month/per year = Social justice event with local artists

OUR EDUCATION DIRECTOR

Marlon Richardson, AKA UnLearn The World, is a New York-born and bred EmCee, Producer, Actor, Writer, Activist, and Hip Hop Educator. Having been raised and groomed in the Culture, Music, and Movement of Hip Hop, UnLearn has toured internationally and has released several mixtapes and albums over the course of 20 years in the music industry. UnLearn has always understood and revered Knowledge as an essential 5th element of Hip Hop.

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This understanding is the core motivation behind UnLearn being one of the more active and prominent Hip Hop teaching artists in the Bay Area; lecturing, presenting and leading classes on EmCeeing/Rapping, Beat Making, DJ’ing and the history of Hip Hop in traditional school settings as well as Juvenile detention centers.

In addition to being one of the more popular and dynamic EmCees and performers in the Bay Area, he is also Director and host of Return Of The Cypher, the only weekly Hip Hop event in San Francisco, as well as the Vice President of the All Tribes San Francisco Chapter of Zulu Nation.

"The thing I like about Hip Hop For Change is that I like that we get to express ourselves, not just express ourselves through words, but through our hearts, and give value to what we really want. Just this platform, it opens up so much opportunity to do just that and be creative, and expand."

- Jamal, student from Larkin Street Youth Services

EDUCATION PARTNERS