Advocacy

Dickens, Illustrated

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By the time you read this, I should hopefully be at my sister’s house teasing my nephews. Fear not loyal readers, for I have scheduled a series of posts according to my usual publishing schedule. I will also be attending the Association of Performing Arts Presenters conference at the beginning of January and should have some insights to report from there.

As I was looking back at some old entries to see if there was anything I might want to link back to in my absence, I came across a post about groups trying to use graphic novels to get kids interested in great literature. In that entry, I noted that something similar had been tried with Classics Illustrated back in my parents day but had failed because there was too much content to squeeze into too few pages.

It got me to thinking, it might be possible to do a credible job by turning great works into web comics. I will confess one of my guilty pleasures is to follow a number of web comics. One I will cop to reading is posits that the world mythologies are actually based on the conflicts between humanoid aliens from another dimension, one group holding to a philosophy of authoritarian rule (Titans) vs. a more free will philosophy (Greek gods).

Because it is expected the story will unfold over the course of months or years, some of the restrictions inherent to print don’t apply. Also because people can read the comic on computers and mobile devices, distribution issues are less problematic.

There are plenty of classics like A Tale of Two Cities that will make for exciting reading without any need for embellishment. A lot of plays, operas and ballets could benefit from a comic book adaptation as well. Linking to the completed comic could serve as a study guide for a lot of organizations.

Yes, students would use the comics as a substitute for reading the book for class. But they are already watching the movie, reading synopses and buying papers as a substitute for work already. Doing a thorough job with the web comic would provide an opportunity to make people aware of the full content of the literature that they would normally avoid reading.

Even Great Artists Need Recess

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I may be beating a long dead horse here but last week the National Endowment for the Arts linked to a NY Times article from their Twitter account asking what people thought. The article in question was about how public schools in NYC were having arts classes during recess. I tweeted in response that I thought it was great, but that when I was a kid, I had art, music AND recess. The title of the article touts the school as being highly rated.

While I am happy these kids are getting some arts exposure, I wonder how it can really be seen as an improvement and a credit to their high rating that they had to do it during recess. It’s a shame that that the only time students can have the experience. It is with some chagrin that I tell the story of my first day in high school where I was trying to figure out when we would be allowed outside for recess. The memory of realizing I wouldn’t be having recess any more still causes a little ache.

I have to wonder, is there really so much more to learn these days that they have to squeeze arts classes and recess out? I know arts get cut for financial reasons, but if a school has the resources to offer it during recess, then they could offer classes as well, right? It has been 30 years since I was in elementary school, but I don’t think there have been that many developments in history, reading, mathematics and science in that time that can’t be covered in the course of all the elementary years of school.

If they have to spend so much additional time teaching and testing material for kids, that must mean those of us in the previous generations fell short of learning all that was required of us, correct? I quake in fear for what it will mean for me when these kids grow up and bring their superior knowledge capacity to bear, pushing me out of my job.

Okay, while it may indeed happen one day that my knowledge will be obsolete compared to younger people, I am fairly certain it won’t all hinge on the differences between what we learned in elementary school. In fact, I may retain my superiority over them simply because of the freedom of recess I enjoyed in elementary school.

Dr. Todd B. Kashdan recently had a piece on the Creativity Post about this very topic. (my emphasis)

If you want children to do well in school, give them dedicated time to play, sing, dance, build something out of wood, or whatever their fancy. There is a myth that time spent in these activities is time better spent cramming in more information for all important high stakes tests. Unfortunately, the brain doesn’t work that way. We each have a finite amount of willpower and when this willpower is exhausted, carrots and sticks are not going to change this fact. Our brains need time for restoration and replenishment. Discover what kids are passionate about and set them free to pursue it. Let me repeat that, set them free. Do not overly structure their recess. Do not overly structure their play time. This is a time for them to recharge their batteries. In return, you will get a greater frequency of creative, curious, critically thinking youngsters. You will get attentive, engaged students.

There is a great NY Times magazine article on the science behind the finite nature of willpower. There is a shorter version of the information on NPR if you don’t have the willpower to read the article. 😉 (Though as you will learn, you might be able to get some will power by eating a cookie!)

The more I read about the importance of allowing kids free time, the more I appreciate that my elementary school emphasized self-directed learning. (Albeit under the withering gaze of nuns which I am sure counteracted some of the benefits the freedom afforded.)

It occurs to me that arts people shouldn’t just be advocating for arts in the schools, but the free time to explore and express it. I am sure artistic and creative people are well aware of examples from their own disciplines in which a strict teaching environment has had a stultifying effect on the development and joy of young students. The advocacy can’t simply be about providing arts education if it is bereft of an opportunity to play. If students choose to spend their free time peering down at a cell phone texting their friends, it may be in part because they were never provided the opportunity and encouragement to spend it any way else.

Try Ask

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I try a fair number of the strategies/techniques that I cover here. Some work better than others. For example, for the last seven performances we have tried just asking two questions in our surveys, one fun question and one that we really want to know about from our audience. Even with the ability to answer on a hard copy or text your answer, we haven’t gotten a lot of participation.

Except the night this past weekend when we were participating in an Americans for the Arts survey. Strangely, participation in our 2 question survey went up a little when people were faced with filling out a multi-question survey.

We also didn’t get the response I expected for a recent tweet seats program even though it was circulated a fair bit via social media. Though since this was a trial program, the small number of participants suited me fine and the experience will allow us to refine our approach.

In any case, I am sometimes skeptical about how much input and participation we might get from our community with other endeavors. So I was a little surprised and very pleased by the response we received for space naming meeting were recently had. As part of a renovation we hope to undergo, we have been trying to find a new approach to facility and space naming campaigns so we hosted a brainstorming meeting.

Recalling Andrew McIntyre’s assertion that people who are emotionally invested in your organization might only be visiting you in 2-3 year intervals, we invited people who had either donated or purchased tickets to multiple shows over a 3-4 year period. That yielded about 450 names after purging duplicates. We followed up a letter with a reminder email.

While only about 15 people attended the informal lunch meeting, there were about five times as many people expressing pretty heartfelt regrets saying they were honored to be invited and wishing they could be there. We even received some donations though we didn’t ask for any money.

I was really rather surprised at how many people seemed interested in investing more time and effort to provide feedback than would be required for a paper survey. I am sure the fact the purpose of our communication was to give them something (lunch) in return for their participation rather than asking them to pay to participate (season brochure, email newsletter) probably had a positive impact. Perhaps knowing they could participate in a dialogue rather than in the unidirectional conversation of a survey was a factor in their willingness to come to the meeting.

In any case, it was a very constructive experience for us, especially since I had never spoken face to face with 90% of those who attended. We were hearing from a number of new voices. The meeting also ran about an hour longer than we had planned due to the length of the conversations.

I am significantly less skeptical about the prospect of people’s willingness to participate and become invested with us. None of these people may participate in our space naming campaign, but my encounter with them has left me energized and excited. My advice to others who may not believe there is a lot of interest and investment in their programs based on survey response rates is to give a brainstorming type meeting a try. Like us, your attendance to invitees ratio may be fairly low, but you may gain unsought benefits.

(The title of this entry is a Hawaiian pidgin/creole phrase)

Advocation For Arts Careers To High Schoolers

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I was speaking about arts careers at a high school career day today. The high school had been really good about sending out information packets with suggested topics to cover with the students (what skills do you need, what type of education is required, what classes should you be taking right now).

I have done a few of these in the last couple years but it was only after today’s session that I started to think about what arts people should be doing when they get the opportunity to speak to students about arts careers. There are guides written about presenting testimony to government entities and speaking to businesses about the benefits of the arts. There is a lot written on getting the arts back in schools, but not a lot has been created on the subject of advocating arts careers, or even just for taking arts classes after graduation, to middle and high school students.

This might present a significant challenge given that the students may not have had many arts experiences or at least recognize it as such. Unlike adults who might view the arts as having value in the context of the economic health of an area even if they do not often attend themselves, students may not have developed many impressions at all.

One of the reasons I started thinking about this is that I shifted my approach somewhat mid-stream today. While I think the result was better than what I had planned, I think there is still plenty of room for improvement. Maybe those of you focused more on arts education have worked all this out already and can provide some guidance.

I worked up a powerpoint presentation with images of what we do at the theatre now, including the ways our students are making their own opportunities. I also had job descriptions from various positions in performing and visual arts – production managers, art handlers, outreach assistants, etc to show students that there were opportunities beyond just performing.

The first session went pretty well from my point of view at the time and I got through the slides. The second session took a little longer to go through the slides. By the third session I had basically abandoned the slides and only showed 2 or 3 for the remaining two sessions of the day.

Essentially I went from talking to them to having a conversation with them about what they were doing now arts wise, what they wanted to do with their careers, why they didn’t want to pursue their artistic interests as a career and for those who did want to pursue it, what factors were standing in their way. I made this shift partially out of a realization that I wasn’t practicing what I am trying to preach about engaging audiences and partially because the questions they were asking pointed toward concerns in these areas.

In the process, I came to realize that a lot of the claims about the skills and abilities of the Millennial generation are a little inflated by the media. These kids are pretty much like I was in high school, a little unsure of themselves and appreciative of the wisdom of others (and just as practiced at exhibiting disinterest). Yes, they will probably grow up and outstrip the accomplishments of those who preceded them, but we old farts still have something of value to offer at present.

We had discussions about parents not being supportive of aspirations and wanting their kids to be lawyers. I talked about developing portfolios of your work and creating speculative pieces to showcase talent since they won’t necessarily have pieces they have created for a job. We talked about creating your brand both online and with face to face networking and housing your portfolio of work online for people to reference. (Which surprisingly didn’t seem to have occurred to many of them.)

I also gave them some tips about how to create opportunities for themselves to exhibit their talent. How to approach people with resources they may need, what those people may expect from them and how and work out mutually beneficial arrangements.

What was interesting to me was that in this age of television shows like American Idol which make it seem like success is achievable in terms of weeks rather than years, there were really very few students who were absolutely sure that they would make it. While there were a few people who said that they wouldn’t pursue their artistic interests as a career due to impracticality or low income potential, most simply lacked confidence in their own abilities.

My underlying message to everyone was to stay in school (naturally) and the benefits of different disciplines for their careers – liberal arts and social sciences so you can understand what motivates people; science to gain the skills to examine situations objectively as well as understand the properties of materials one might work with as an artist; business and law/contracts to understand how to protect your interests.

Ultimately, of course, I kept pressing the idea that you had to nurture your artistic passion and creativity in whatever you pursued. Fortunately, the teacher had a guitar in the classroom which helped to reinforce that concept.

So what else can you say to students preparing to go to college who may not have ever really experienced or thought about the value/place of arts and creativity in their lives to awaken their minds to the possibilities?