With its brand new Milpitas Performing Arts Center, the Milpitas Unified School District (MUSD) has completely outdone itself. 

From the spacious 557-foot theater to the dressing rooms to the state-of-the-art classrooms and rehearsal spaces, the beautifully-designed center is a wonder to behold. 

Yesterday, in the late afternoon, MUSD held a ribbon-cutting ceremony and invited the community into the doors of the center for the first time. 

There was a sense of awe from the crowd as they navigated through the giant space, exploring all its many facets. Every hallway, every classroom, every corner turned was yet another opportunity to be enveloped in the center’s magic. 

The main theater has theatrical rigging, a dedicated AV room, a catwalk, and an orchestra pit. There’s also a modern ticketing office and concessions area, along with a smaller blue box theater space. The center also boasts premier instructional spaces, featuring specialized classrooms for choral, band, and orchestra programs, as well as dedicated areas for drama studies. Rehearsal/practice rooms are all sound-proofed and feature acoustic paneling.

MUSD broke ground on the Milpitas Performing Arts Center in January of 2024. The main entrance is right off of Escuela Parkway, on the northeast side of the front of Milpitas High’s campus. The Performing Arts Center is one of MUSD’s Measure AA projects, funded by a $284 million dollar bond measure that was passed by residents in 2018. This project, along with others – including MUSD’s new Innovation Campus, the modernization at Randall World Languages School, and the new tracks at both Rancho and Thomas Russell middle schools – is part of MUSD’s exciting wave of evolution over these last several years.  

Photo from the Milpitas Performing Arts Center ribbon-cutting on March 19, 2026. Photo courtesy of MUSD.

“This theater will help learners throughout Milpitas Unified to explore pathways such as visual arts, music, instrumental arts, stage production, playwriting, theatrics, dance, even public speaking. Whatever they see, they can be it,” said Superintendent Cheryl Jordan to the audience gathered at the ribbon-cutting. 

Kritika Mishra, a seventh-grader at Rancho Middle School who plays the flute, came up to speak about her excitement over the center’s opening.

“I can’t wait to perform on a real stage with great lighting right here in our own school. As a music student, this means that we’ll have more opportunities to practice, present, and become better musicians,” said Mishra. “I’m so excited that Milpitas has this awesome center now. It really shows our school’s care about music and the arts and giving students a place to learn and create.”  

Beyond its role in education, the space will serve as a vibrant Milpitas hub of arts, culture, and community. Along with using it for theater and music classes and student productions, MUSD also plans to rent the space out to professionals, bringing other plays, performances, music shows, and events to the community. 

“The vision of the board is that not only will our children have an opportunity to have a world class experience, but it’s also our vision to bring world-class performers and artists to this facility. So we can show taxpayers that their investment continues to build the capacity of this community for years to come. We’re excited that you’re all going to be a part of this,” said MUSD Board of Education President Chris Norwood before the ribbon-cutting. 

Superintendent Jordan later told The Beat in an interview: 

“Besides bringing in the opportunity for people in the community to have a professional experience, it also brings us the opportunity to bring in revenue that we can then circulate back into our performing arts programs, and making sure we maintain the building and the condition it’s in now.” 

There is talk of transforming the old theater space and rebuilding it into a Student Union. But that would be a future project that would require its own funding down the road. 

“Environment really does speak to possibility. I want people who walk into this space to look around and get that feeling like there’s so much possibility here,” said Jordan. “And that they can feel that they’re a part of all this possibility.”