BETTY has used music and workshops effectively to help more than 250 nonprofit organizations raise funds for their work. Through performances, workshops and trainings, BETTY has reached and empowered tens of thousands of young people, women, LGBTQ individuals and groups to become more involved in social movements and stand up for their rights. BETTY’s concerts and presentations are in demand in sc
hools, at meetings and conferences, addressing nonprofit organizations and corporations, and at places where people gather to share information and resources. Internationally, BETTY is honored to be named Arts Envoys for the US State Department and take part in numerous cultural exchange tours. The tours through India, Lithuania, Estonia, Latvia, Argentina, Mexico and the Czech Republic led to the latest self-advocacy workshop, “RISE: Using Your Unique Voice To Create Change”. Pioneered with groups of students, poets, performing artists, community organizers and survivors of sexual trafficking in Delhi, Shillong, Kolkata, Guwahati and Hyderabad in India, BETTY’s program helped attendees focus on self-determination and effective expression while creating performances for self-empowerment. BETTY has been blessed by the opportunity to watch shy or withdrawn people blossom during their workshops. Those participants make the experience so fun that BETTY has ceased calling the trainings “work” and are piloting their “PLAYshop” program. Using entertaining games and exercises that promote effective self-expression, as well as some elements of the excitement of flash mobs and other public entertainment, The BETTY Effect PLAYshops are based on the simple fact that each one of us has voice, even those of us without the ability to speak, and each of us has a right to our story. Sharing them makes us stronger. BETTY believes that positive energy helps heal the world. In addition to BETTY going back on tour to universities, the band is launching a “Community & College Tour” to reach underserved groups of older students, predominantly women, with fewer resources than those at 4-year colleges, often already in the work force and often from immigrant and diverse backgrounds at Community Colleges across America.
