State of the Arts

Teach First, Ask Questions Later

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Along the theme of my post yesterday about good ideas, I wanted to point out some interesting ideas about higher education for arts majors suggested by David Cutler on The Savvy Musician blog.

I won’t say all the ideas are completely viable, Cutler doesn’t make that claim either, but some implementation of the basic intent might be practical enough to break up the status quo a little.

One of the common themes of Cutler’s suggestions is predicated on the fact students looking for a career in the arts need to be more than just talented artists. They need to be good collaborators and have some basic entrepreneurial ambitions. He proposes evaluating those factors right from the time of auditions.

He also suggests multidisciplinary approaches including more allowances for electives, having at least two areas of specialty and working with different specialists.

“Encourage or require students to select at least two areas of specialty throughout their single degree program. This priority reflects the real world, where artists must possess multiple skill sets to survive and thrive.

[…]

“For at least one semester, each student studies with someone from another artistic specialty. Imagine the lessons a violinist might learn from a cellist, trombonist, dancer, or painter.”

This idea appealed to me because one of my former employers ran a residential arts and music camp where students had one major (an area they were already good at) and two minors (areas the want to explore.) The focus there was more about letting kids explore disciplines they had no experience in but were curious about. They might learn they were really awful at it or might gain a new interest.

A more rigorous approach in higher education could give students cross-training they may need in their careers but also provide the basis of increased avenues for creative expression.

What really interested me were some of Cutler’s ideas about what the educational experience might look like:

Paradigm 4: CLASSES & ASSIGNMENTS

Traditional model. Classes are typically built around a lecture. Students are assigned homework or projects to complete on their own time.
An alternative. On their own time, students watch lectures online. During class, the teacher works interactively with them on homework, projects, and other experiential endeavors.

If this alternative model sounds like wishful thinking, let me assure you what he suggests is very close to how some math classes are being taught on my campus right now. The approach has been very successful in terms of improved grades and student persistence.

Paradigm 5: PRIVATE LESSONS

Traditional model. Music students typically take a one hour lesson with a specialist in their area each week (i.e. violinist study with violin professors).
[…]

Alternative C. Teachers are in their office for certain hours each week. Students are free to show up as often as they want, and stay as long as they desire. If unprepared one week, perhaps they shouldn’t waste the teacher’s time with a meeting. On the other hand, maybe someone could benefit from 3 lessons a week leading to an audition. This open structure also allows students to observe their teacher interacting with others who face similar/different challenges, teaching valuable lessons in pedagogy and beyond. (This is the model I experienced when studying composition at the Hochschule für Musik in Vienna, Austria).

Cutler also proposes flipping the timing on education students’ teaching semesters and doctoral candidates’ orals from the last semester to the first.

The benefit for student teachers is, “This shows them what needs to be learned early on, and frames their entire college experience.”

For graduate students, “Begin the degree with some version of orals. Get people excited about researching and learning on their own before choosing classes.”

Now granted, I wonder how valuable having a completely inexperienced student teacher would be to the school in which they were placed. That whole experience would probably have to be redesigned.

I do think he is spot on saying that it would show arts ed. students what needed to be learned. I think I have mentioned before that when I was pursuing certification in secondary ed, everyone in my cohort agreed that it would have been helpful to have had a refresher course in grammar rules before we had done our student teaching. We would have paid more attention to that throughout our college careers had we known just how terrifying it would be being uncertain.

In terms of career preparation, he suggests students having a career mentor rather than (or in addition to) an artistic mentor for at least one semester. Instead of doing a summer or semester long internship, “Partner students with an external organization throughout their studies, so they are constantly challenged by real-world, practical concerns and trends.”

I have only covered some of his proposals and I quoted some of his ideas out of their original context (though I feel I accurately represent his overall argument) so you should check out his blog if any of this sounds intriguing.

If you are like me, when you read it you will wonder where in a student’s studies would there be time to implement many of these ideas. But I think his whole point is that the entire approach and prioritization of art student learning needs to be examined and revamped in order to make the experience and the degree granted more relevant.

Do The Arts And Millennials Share The Same Core Values?

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Last month there was an article on Fast Company, Why Millennials Don’t Want To Buy Stuff, that claims the focus is moving away from acquisition of things toward access to ideas and relationships.

Though the article also admits it might be because they can’t afford stuff either.

They also point out many “goods” we consume are actually rented or licensed from services like Netflix, iTunes or Amazon’s Kindle. Exchanging money for a transient product is the norm for Millennials in a way it isn’t for previous generations.

According to the article, when Millennials do buy things it is motivated by one of three things. Either the item provides access to other experiences in the manner of most Apple products; the item can be used to develop a relationship or sense of community; or the item makes a statement about themselves to others.

Of course, there tends to be a lot of overlap between these motivators since sharing experiences enabled by a product can make a statement about yourself which can be shared with like-minded people.

If the article is correct, arts and cultural experiences are pretty well suited to Millenials. The experience is transient and can’t be possessed as a concrete object. It can provide a sense of community and opportunity for relationship building and can make a statement about the person to others.

Of course, as has oft been discussed, what Millennial wants the statement they are making to be that they like hanging out at a performance hall cultivating a relationship with old people.

The fact that this article just provides a slightly different perspective that brings us back to the conclusion that if you want to attract Millennials, you have to provide an experience they find attractive should be comforting. It means that the answer is so simple and evident that we keep reaching the same conclusion.

Or I suppose that we are so fixated on the idea of attracting Millenials, we lack the imagination to interpret it in any other manner.

There is something to be said for the research that shows people tend to orient toward arts and cultural experiences at a certain age range when they have reached a level of personal and economic maturity. In that respect, there is perhaps too much expectation placed on the Y generation to start attending now.

At the same time, I think that: 1- It never hurts in the cause of creating general awareness to let Millennials know now that the opportunities are available when they are of a mind to attend.

2-The product and approach you used to attract their grandparents and parents isn’t going to work on them so you might as well make your mistakes now while they aren’t really paying attention than trying to refine your approach later when they are.

I am encouraged by the thought that the Fast Company article might reflect the values being embraced by Millennials because I think it plays to the real core strengths of arts and culture. The message that the arts are what you get involved with to exhibit you are mature, cultured and refined is an ill-fitting suit in comparison. We have just been wearing it so long we have mistaken it for our identity rather than garb donned when an opportunity presented itself.

Misunderstanding Your Competition

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To pick up from my last post about the Set In Stone report, the one aspect of the research I was intrigued by was their survey of people’s perceptions of the impacts (or lack thereof) of a new construction project.

As you might imagine, those who perceived themselves to be direct competitors were the least enthusiastic about a new building project. However, the groups who were most enthusiastic were those who were in the same district as the project, but didn’t view themselves as competitors.

Nope, No Impact Here

The report writers note both the positive and negative impacts of a new project- It might compete for audiences and revenues on one hand, but could also bring additional vibrancy to the area attracting businesses and traffic. Interestingly, the perceived impacts of a new project were pretty low.

• No higher than 28 percent of organizations in any subsample believed any change in their attendance was due to the new project opening; that subsample was the most closely linked to the project (competitors in the same district). The full sample result was only 12 percent believing the project opening affected their attendance.

• While 40 percent of competitors in the same district believed the project opening had an effect on new businesses opening in the area…Only 23 percent of the full sample believed the project opening was the key cause of new businesses in the area.

However, in terms of general impact, people were quite positive in their outlook about the project.

• When the question about community impact is posed in general terms, dramatically positive views are expressed. The question “Do you think the project makes the city a more attractive place to live?” generated a uniformly enthusiastic response, with the full sample generating 88 percent positive responses, and competitors within the same district reporting a 96 percent positive response.

There was also a lot of enthusiasm about the impact the new project would have in the community in advance and immediately upon the completion. However, according to the report, after the completion, enthusiasm dropped about 8% for the overall sample. However, for the group that was most enthusiastic–those in the same district who didn’t view themselves as competitors that I mentioned earlier–their optimism about the impact on economic development dropped 16 points.

I should note that the report writers emphasize that it is difficult to separate general economic conditions from project specific conditions as factors in the decline in optimism. They don’t know if the decline is due to problems with the greater economy or specific to the projects.

Foes Are Just Friends Who Compete With You

What was also interesting to me was the perception of competition versus collaboration people had in relation to projects. Those who viewed themselves as direct competitors were most likely to view the project as creating a more competitive environment while those who were located in the same district but did not view themselves as competitors felt the project created a more collaborative environment.

And yet,

Ironically, the group with the highest percentage of organizations believing that cultural organizations feel more competitive (competitors in the same district, also had the most optimistic view about increased tourism (52 percent believed it had increased). Thus, there is no evidence that community organizations link their views about changes in tourism to their views about the effect of the project on the competitive/collaborative climate.

The section of the study about competitiveness was very intriguing to me because so much of it was based on perception rather than reality. Just because people didn’t identify themselves as competitors, doesn’t mean that is really the case. The study found proximity was often a factor in identifying a project as a competitor, even if the cultural discipline didn’t match. You might expect that a museum might view a nearby performing arts center as a competitor.

Yet the study found (and I paraphrase for clarity) that a slightly higher percentage of those who identify themselves as non-competitors were located in the same district and were a cultural discipline match for the expansion project. The report authors state this “is inconsistent with expectations and inconsistent with the results observed for the “competitor” subsamples.”

You Can Have My Audience, Performers and Employees, Just Leave The Money

It made me wonder if there was a degree of wishful thinking/willful blindness among other cultural organizations that the expansion project represented a threat to them. These results left me wondering and wishing the survey had included data on whether local conditions improved or not in the wake of a project. I suspect given the scope of the study, they were unable to assemble a dependable data set to make this comparison.

Still it raises a lot of questions about how accurately cultural organizations, and I daresay businesses as a whole, assess the impact of developments on the economic conditions of their communities. I suspect the assumptions arts and cultural organizations make are little different from those other businesses make about the impact that will result upon the arrival of a big box retailer like WalMart, Best Buy or Home Depot.

Not surprisingly, money seems to be the dominant factor. The study found that the greater the funding for the expansion project came from non-local sources, the less people expressed concern that the environment had become more competitive. The perception of the economic climate seemed to be based mostly on whether the expansion project was making it more difficult to fund raise rather than whether the project was competing for audiences or talented artists and employees.

I wonder if this is something of a statement on the relative importance/availability of funding versus audiences and talent for cultural organizations: People are more easily replaced than money.

Stuff To Ponder: Process and Pitfalls Of Cultural Facility Construction

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If you are planning new building construction or a significant renovation, you would do well to check out the Set in Stone research project performed by the University of Chicago. When I first heard about the site and the research which looks at the construction of cultural arts facilities from 1994-2008, I thought it might be a thinly veiled indictment of overly-ambitious construction of arts centers.

But in fact there is far less failure reported than I expected, (though plenty of struggle), and the site is designed to be a resource for both research on the topic as well as guidance about the whole process. Prominently placed on the page is a six minute video that provides some quick advice about under taking a construction campaign.

Basically, it says people underestimate the project costs and over-estimate their ability to generate the revenue to operate the building upon completion. The video also notes that there are a lot of factors and constituencies with expectations contributing pressure to the project and suggests four questions to continually ask at all stages to keep things on track–or help ultimately decide to terminate the effort.

Four case studies illustrate the impact of these pressures on new facility construction. My favorite is the case study for the Art Institute of Chicago. It really provides some detailed insights into how the ambitions of the board, fundraisers and architect interacted to shape the construction of their new Modern Wing.

There is a quick overview of the study available but you may eventually want to take the time to read the full report. The full paper discusses construction and funding trends around the country and explores the impact of population shift and GDP on some of these trends.

There were some surprising and interesting situations they uncovered like the Pittsfield, MA metropolitan statistical area has the highest per capita spending on construction projects in the country, trailed by San Francisco; Appleton, WI; Madison, WI and Lawrence, KS. Who knew?

Interestingly, the construction during the boom period they researched didn’t seem to be in response to demand from the cultural sector.

This suggests that, in the boom period, increases in the supply of cultural facilities may not have responded to demand increases in the cultural sector. In fact, the evidence suggests that the relationships were negative during the boom period; either there was overinvestment in the supply of facilities relative to cultural sector demand for facilities, or facilities investment may have been responding to something else altogether.

What I also found interesting was that population size didn’t impact how much a city invested in the cultural infrastructure but rather how fast the population was increasing or decreasing. If the population started increasing, so did the investment in infrastructure.

What I found most informative was a comparison of the construction processes of different types of cultural organizations. There were assets and liabilities generally common to each type of cultural organization: producing theatres, museums, non-resident performing arts centers and resident performing arts centers.

Producing theatres seemed to have the easiest time with the process going from conception to completion in a relatively short time (7 years). Producing theatres were motivated to advance their mission and were able to keep that front and center throughout the process. They had the biggest cost overruns at 92% higher than the initial budget, (my emphasis)

“However, the starting budget was usually an internal figure and these projects’ managers were clever about when to announce their budgets publicly so that the escalations did not appear outrageous to the community. Interestingly, the publicly perceived escalations were often much lower—an average of about 19 percent. More importantly, the escalations that did occur often had a clear connection to organizational needs and were seen as helping the organization pursue its artistic mission.”

Museums also had a relatively short conception to completion time (about 9 years). One of the biggest challenges the report says they face is strong boards who often meddle with the plans often blurring a clear sense of leadership and leading to a fairly high rate of turnover on project boards. Cost overruns were only about 46% but were due to non-mission critical additions. Also museums were not able to be as flexible about generating revenue and often had to cut staffing and programming to deal with budget shortfalls.

The construction of Non-resident performing art centers were often strongly motivated by service to the community. (my emphasis)

“However, more often than not, community need for the nonresident PAC was not accurately determined. For example, a large majority of these projects used economic impact arguments as rationales for building. Included in these arguments was the implicit assumption that by building a cultural facility in a blighted area, it would automatically attract and sustain a substantial audience who would not otherwise have ventured there. Nine times out of ten, these assumptions were not accurately tested, and when the facility project was completed, the desired swarm of activity never materialized…Since the motivation for the project was so strongly centered in the desire to culturally enrich the broader community in a necessarily general way, a specific organizational artistic mission (if there was one) was often swept aside or obscured by a general enthusiasm for the idea of building a new arts facility for local residents.”

This situation resulted partially because these projects were organized by groups operating from a shared leadership model which meant there is often no clear stated central vision. Cost overruns of 62% were attributed to delays and lack of organization in the decision making process. Non-resident performing arts centers were generally flexible in their ability to absorb the overruns thanks to their low operating costs. Unfortunately, because most of the costs came from presenting performances, the preferred option to reducing expenses is usually to reduce programming.

Resident Performing Arts Centers have the hardest time getting started, mostly due to the need to serve the disparate requirements of multiple resident companies which often represent different arts disciplines. Because the founding organizations are often well-established, each with their own board of directors, a single clear, consistent leader is often difficult to identify.

These projects averaged 12 years from conception to completion, which doesn’t include the feasibility study period preceding the project proposal. Influence of the various groups can wax and wane quite a bit in that time. The constituent groups may be unwilling to cede authority even to the performing arts center executive once the facility begins operations. Changes in plans and leadership often means opening dates are frequently rescheduled.

“First, resident PACs were the costliest among all the different categories of projects. On average, they cost approximately $109 million to build and went about 64 percent over their initial proposed budgets. On a per seat basis, the median dollar per seat for resident PACs was $37,527, compared to $12,155 for nonresident PACs.”

The need to serve many resident organizations means that the resident PAC has less flexibility to use its spaces to generate additional revenue for the facility. Also, all the organizations are in the same boat together. If one organization faces a distressing situation, it impacts the future of all.

There were some other interesting observations that resulted from the study that I will address in a later entry. As I said, the Set In Stone site provides some pretty good resources and information to help you recognize and perhaps avoid problems others have faced with their major construction projects.