The Prairie Landscape

The Studs Terkel Humanities Service Award - 2006


Diana Czekalski

Nominated By The Honorable Peter N. Silvestri


Elmwood Park


Diana Czekalski

In her 21 years as a teacher and theatre director in the Elmwood Park school system, Diana Czekalski has enhanced the lives of her students by bringing to them a greater knowledge and appreciation of the arts, the humanities, and the history of their community. Ms. Czekalski designed the curriculum for the high school's mandatory "Survival Skills" class, which teaches students about the history of the school and of Elmwood Park. She has brought Shakespeare and other works of literature to life both for the Special Education students in her English classes as well as for the participants in and audiences for Romeo and Juliet, A Midsummer Night's Dream, and countless other plays she has produced for the high school's theatre department. To capitalize on Ms. Czekalski's longstanding involvement with drama, Elmwood Park Village President Peter Silvestri, recently asked her to serve on the Village's Arts Commission and to coordinate a new community theatre program

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