Virginia G. Piper Charitable Trust Picks Leah Fregulia as Fellow

Leah Fregulia, the CEO of Arizona School for the Arts (ASA), has been selected by Virginia G. Piper Charitable Trust as a 2016 Piper Fellow.
The fellowship will help Fregulia raise visibility for ASA as a national model in education. Piper Trust selects up to six Piper Fellows annually.
“The fellowship will help enable ASA to serve as a proven model and inspiration of what works in education,” said Fregulia, who was a founding faculty member of ASA in 1995 and served as the school’s principal for nine years prior to assuming her current role as CEO and Head of School in 2008.
During Fregulia’s leadership tenure, ASA has doubled in size, built a permanent campus in the Phoenix Central Arts District and established partnerships throughout the business arts and education sectors.
Unlike most U.S. schools that offer a rigorous college preparatory education combined with a performing arts curriculum, ASA’s student admissions are not based on arts auditions or academic tests scores. The school draws its 5th-12th grade student body through public lottery. While all enrolled students must select a performing arts focus in either theater, music, or dance, no prior arts experience is required. This enables access to the arts for students of all backgrounds.
As part of the Piper Fellowship, Fregulia will be engaging with a national coalition of arts leaders and advocates in Chicago, New York and Washington, using ASA as a model and impetus for thought leadership in education.
“The arts have the power to transform us, elevate our experiences, stimulate our creativity and our curiosity, and connect us with one another. Beyond this intrinsic value, study in the arts contributes to student achievement, success and happiness,” said Fregulia. “This Fellowship is a first step toward showing the power of the arts as a transformative agent in school and toward building a case for equity and access to artistic study for all children.”
ASA was ranked in the top 15 schools in Arizona for combined SAT scores in 2015 and ranked as a Silver Medal Top School in the U.S. by US News and World Report. The school has also been named an AZ Civic Engagement School of Excellence and is the recipient of the Governor’s Arts Award for Educational Organization as well as the Grammy School Enterprise Award.