Following a successful 2007 program in Santa Fe, members of GIA and Grantmakers for Education (GFE) came together in May 2008 for an Arts and Education Forum in the Boston area. Collectively, over fifty of our members took part in a program that included discussions with government and school leaders, researchers, and inventors. The program examined how one region has tackled the challenge of arts integration and looked at ways that arts and technology could be powerful partners in learning. The following three essays were prepared by participants.
Between 2006 and 2008, the Social Impact of the Arts Project, a research group at the University of Pennsylvania (SIAP), collaborated with The Reinvestment Fund (TRF), a community development financial institution, on an investigation of the creative sector's potential contribution to neighborhood economic and community development.
A continuation of the discussion on strategic operating support grants. Do these grants improve an organization's accountability and stability? How do private and public grantmakers sustain the arts ecosystem without creating an over-dependence on any one funder? When providing strategic operating support for organizational change, where does the funder's role end and the arts organization's board of directors' role begin and end?
A working session to review the Coalition's draft publication, "A National Blueprint for Emergency Preparedness, Relief and Recovery for Artists," and other Coalition works in progress. Also, discussion of a draft plan to give grantmakers better resources for learning about emergency readiness, response, and recovery, and to improve and coordinate safety nets for artists during regional or national emergencies.
Cornelia Carey, Craft Emergency Relief Fund (moderator); Carolyn Somers, Joan Mitchell Foundation (interlocutor).
