Kids On Stage was created IN 1996 as an arm of the Hillsboro School PTO. It's intention was to provide an arts-based curriculum to a rural elementary/middle school with a high percentage of poor families and consistently low standardized test scores.
Several local musicians and businesspeople, including Gene Cotton and Aubrey Preston, contributed resources, contacts and time to begin a rock band. Soon, a large art room was built, along with computer lab and technology center, a black box theater and a music lab with recording studio. Within the next year, the visual, performing and technical arts were integrated into every aspect of the Hillsboro School curriculum, under the guidance of Kids On Stage Director Rick Wheeler.
Kids On Stage Summer Academy was implemented in order to expand the programming beyond the school year. Beginning with a week long half-day program of songwriting and rock bands for approximately 30 students, it was expanded greatly over nine years by Summer Academy Director Gene Cotton to include some 40-plus classes in art, photography, music, theater, dance, film, recording arts and music business. As of 2008, Summer Academy included over 600 students from Williamson County and beyond to some fifteen states and as far away as France.
Under current Director Mimi Johnston, Kids On Stage has expanded to include year-round after school and Saturday programming, including guitar, keyboard and vocal instruction, painting, sculpture, mosaic, photography, acting and improv. Several "Boot Camp" classes, which incorporate in-depth study with performances at premier local clubs like Puckett's Grocery, which Johnston helped establish in 2002, while teaching keyboard at KOS Summer Academy.