A 4-Level Learn It · Live It · Share It STEAM challenge — built with love to honor the International Jazz Day Proclamation, and to carry the history, science, and human story of jazz from the cities where it was born.
“Jazz is America's improvised conversation — protest, prayer, and joy all at once. I'll walk you through all four levels. Listen first, then learn the history, then play for your school, then make it yours. Let's advance the dream together.”
Every level pays out in real coins toward your school or team-club total. Start at Level 1 — the rest unlock as you go.
Understand the history, context, and intention of jazz. Press play on the Where As, Jazz Is song across its genre journeys, then drop a one-line reflection on what you heard.
Meet the great jazz historians, performers, and the meaning behind the songs. A playable Category Qwest board (Solo · Team Battle · Live Versus) plus the Advance the Groove arcade — with 🏫 Class Mode that credits every student at the player level.
Explore the other Force for Health song categories — health, science, nutrition, and career paths — to bank as many points for your school or team-club as possible. Includes the extended VIP 12-Card Bingo system.
Your school contributes a performance of one version of one song — and the why behind it. Or pick a song from the past, complete the WHY, and perform it as part of our A-Cubed Events in May/June.
One song — “Celebrating the International Jazz Day Proclamation” — reimagined across genre journeys. Press play, listen for what changes, then favorite the version that moves you. Each play moves you closer to your first coin.
Jazz is a national story told in regional accents. Our pilot follows it across five cities, in the midst of Josh's memory and legacy, and asks: what did each place add to the conversation?
The frontier of the music — desert festivals, West Coast cool, and the Tucson Jazz Society's stewardship in honor of Clarence Ezell Boykins. Where the dream keeps moving forward.
The birthplace and the proving ground — Congo Square to Lincoln Center. Where the Marsalis family carries the first-family-of-jazz lineage from the Garden District to the world stage.
Real Force for Health coins — banked to your school or team-club total, and surfaced on the Reality Health Games™ leaderboard.
For listening, the Category Qwest, and the Bingo Card history challenges (Levels 1–2).
For crossing into the health, science & career song categories and the VIP 12-Card Bingo (Level 3).
For performing your why and submitting it to the A-Cubed Events (Level 4).
Anyone can run the challenge as a free external resource or after-school club add-on. For a per-school fee, teachers unlock full backend reporting and official inclusion in the Reality Health Games™.
This challenge stands on real shoulders: Clarence Ezell Boykins, who advanced the dream of jazz in Arizona and Tucson; advisory-board educator Jen Thielacker, whose passion is teaching and preserving the legacy of jazz; and the season prize that ties it all together — a Marsalis concert for the winning school's hometown, with local student performers sharing the stage alongside the first family of jazz.
“Press play, then pass it on. The more schools that join, the bigger the stage we can build — and the closer one of you gets to performing for your city.”
Where As, Jazz Is is being built with the culture-bearers who live this music. Together with The Force for Health® Network, we're growing it from a local pilot into a national competition — a friendly, city-vs-city season that supports young musicians and deepens the appreciation of jazz as an American art form.
Our founding cultural partner and the Arizona representative for International Jazz Day. Home of the Clarence Ezell Boykins Scholarship Fund and a new middle-school fine-arts program — the West Coast anchor of the challenge.
Advisor to The Force for Health and Music Education Director — Education Through Music for the New York City schools. Her passion for teaching and preserving the legacy of jazz shapes the curriculum behind Levels 2 and 4, connecting the challenge to real classrooms coast to coast.
A possible partnership with Nicole and Branford / Wynton Marsalis and the first family of jazz — carrying the lineage from New Orleans to the national stage, and the season's dream prize: a Marsalis concert for the winning city, with local students on the bill.
Announcement — Fall 2026: an in-school education partnership launching through the Pima County School Superintendent's office (Supt. Dustin Williams), bringing Where As, Jazz Is into classrooms as the template we take nationwide with the Force for Health Network.
From Tucson and San Francisco to New Orleans and New York — a national sport of jazz, where every school that plays helps carry the music forward. Partners & schools who want in: let's talk.