Culver City High School’s Academy of Visual & Performing Arts Foundation recently received a $1,000 donation from McComb Orthodontics Culver City as its ramps up its 2026 fundraising cycle.
Bronwyn Jamrok, of the AVPA Foundation accepted the $1000 donation from Dr. Ryan McComb of McComb Orthodontics Culver City.
Dr. McComb made the gift to support arts programming for students across the five disciplines AVPA serves at the school: Theatre, Visual Art, Film, Dance, and Music.
“This check will go so far toward supporting all of our art students at Culver City High School,” Jamrok said. “It will go toward arts instruction, musical instruments, art supplies, dance supplies, film supplies, and support staff who help oversee the lighting and audio visuals at Robert Frost Auditorium.”
Robert Frost Auditorium is the centerpiece performance venue on the Culver City High School campus and the production home for AVPA’s theater, dance, and music programs. Lights, sound, and technical operations at the auditorium support school plays, dance concerts, music recitals, film screenings, and student-led productions throughout the academic year. Community contributions to the AVPA Foundation help cover the cost of the teaching artists, materials, and technical staff that public school district funding does not fully reach.
“AVPA gives Culver City students access to film, theater, music, dance, and visual art at a level you usually only see at private schools, and it does it through an incredible public high school in our neighborhood,” Dr. McComb said. “The families we treat at our Washington Boulevard practice are the same families whose kids walk into Robert Frost Auditorium for productions and recitals every spring. After 10 years practicing in Culver City, we wanted to put our support behind a program that has been training the next generation of Culver City artists for thirty years and shows no signs of slowing down. Programs like AVPA do not run on district funding alone. They run on community contributions, parent volunteers, and small businesses that decide the arts are worth showing up for.”
The Academy of Visual & Performing Arts at Culver City High School was founded in 1996 through a grant from the State of California, with major early support from Sony Pictures Entertainment, whose Culver City studio lot sits less than two miles from the high school campus. In the three decades since, AVPA has grown into one of the longest-running performing arts academies of its kind at a California public high school. The program now offers after-school classes, workshops, and full-scale productions across its five Schools, alongside regular day classes that carry UC/CSU A-G credit and Career Technical Education (CTE) pathways in Theatre, Film, Dance, and Music Technology.
AVPA classes are led by certificated teachers, with professional teaching artists brought in throughout the year to teach workshops, lead productions and exhibitions, and work directly with students on projects. Major funding for the program comes from the Culver City Unified School District and the AVPA Foundation, the 501(c)(3) parent-volunteer nonprofit that supplements district funding with community contributions, sponsorships, and fundraising events.
Culver Pride
Photo – Bronwen Jamrock with Dr. Ryan McComb
