The Sedona-based creative duo of Dev Ross and Shondra Jepperson are holding workshops on communication with students across the Verde Valley as part of one of their latest projects, stylized with the spelling “WEirD Detention,” a feature-length musical.

“‘WEirD Detention’” is kind of a ‘Breakfast Club’ gone [musical],” Jepperson said. “It’s about three teens that get into a very strange detention, it’s a room that they can’t get out of. And there’s an old pinball machine in there, and it’s covered up, and they’re going crazy, because they don’t — they have no access to anything. They are three completely different kinds of kids … one kid is an intellectual-bully, the other is a bully-bully and the other one doesn’t want to be seen … And the pinball machine comes alive and three divas come out. And they teach them nonviolent communication, which is active listening, and how to maneuver conversations to actively listen to hear people and be able to respond and [a] better way of communicating.”

With the help of producer and educator Kate Yurka Spangler, Ross and Jepperson have also been developing an educational curriculum to accompany the film.

“The movie is one component, because the idea is that we’re going to make a movie here in Sedona, or we’re going to do it home-grown,” Jepperson said. “I don’t know yet how we’re going to do this, we might do it guerilla like and do a proof of concept, or we might just make money that we need through donations … The other parts of this is that after we either sell it, or we make it, we have a curriculum. Our dream is to have this curriculum in schools across the United States, if not even international that we teach kids the basics of active listening.”

The Harvard Review defined active listening as “when you not only hear what someone is saying, but also attune to their thoughts and feelings.”

The duo did a “beta of a beta” test of the How to Listen Curriculum with students at the Cottonwood-Oak Creek School District and middle schoolers at Sedona Red Rock High School near the end of the fall semester.

“The students had so much fun while they were learning the skills and abilities of emotional intelligence and conflict resolution,” SOCSD teacher Isabel Fritzler wrote to the duo. “They experience different scenarios where they need to work as a team, use self-control, self-awareness, outer awareness, show curiosity, focus, practice listening and responding and building social skills to be better communicators. The day the substitute teacher came, he told me how well you handled some student disagreements, and how you got them to communicate better with each other.”

“We just can’t take one more thing on right now,” COCSD Superintendent Steve King said. “But anybody that’s doing anything with violence prevention and conflict prevention I’m very supportive of, and I wish them nothing but the best and it’s very intriguing what they’re doing.”

The film production of “WEirD Detention” is still in the planning stages. Ross said that the group is hoping to shoot in the Mingus Union High School auditorium.

“It could work for a film crew and film setting, or we will shoot out in a black box,” Ross said. “We’re talking about a K-pop star from Korea to be one of the singers. We’re really making this a Sedona-Verde Valley project and we have a lot of people working with us to raise money. We’re basically tired of the gun debate, how do we curb violence? How do we curb violence? So we don’t want to talk about guns anymore. We want to talk about curbing the violence before it even arises. For the kids at least, to get them back. In real time, communication with each other and knowing how to do it compassionately, and with curiosity, rather than judgment.”

For more information about the project visit weirddetention.com.