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Army For The Arts

June 30, 2010

by:

Joe Patti

Americans for the Arts recently linked to a blog post and testimony video that Brigadier General Nolen Bivens, U.S. Army, (Ret) delivered to Congress on the importance of the arts to national security. He discusses how the arts contribute to cultural understanding and method of diplomacy around the world in places of conflict that the Army operates as well as places the country wants to maintain good relations. He also mentioned the usefulness of the arts in the therapy of soldiers.

Interesting enough, just about the time Gen. Bivens was giving this testimony in April, Vinita Rae Smith was recording an interview discussing her retirement as theatre manager of the Army Community Theatre after a 40 year career as a civil service employee of the Army. She gives a sense of the state of the theatre arts in the Army these days. She has the distinction of opening the only theater the Army has ever constructed for the express purpose of being a theater -Ft. Knox, Kentucky. Every other theater has been re-purposed from some other use. One of theater she worked at was renovated from a laundromat. That theater is still used to show movies, but the stage is no longer structurally sound enough for live performances.

She didn’t mention what the Richardson Theatre which she recently ran used to be. The woman participating in the interview with her reminisced that before Vinita arrived, they used to have to wait until the movies were over at 11:00 pm before they could start rehearsing so they didn’t generally finish until 1-2 am. Vinita made changes that resulted in a more sane schedule.

But while Vinita improved the situation for live theatre on her post, the same can’t be said for all Army bases worldwide. She mentioned that Germany used to have 30 theatres, now there are about 14. Korea had 13 and now there is one. Some of it is likely a result of the decreasing number of troops stationed in these countries and the reduced need for services. But I also suspect Gen. Bivens might have been indirectly advocating for support of the arts in the military too. Even before she thought of retiring, it was generally acknowledged that Vinita was holding her program together by force of will. You get that sense as you listen to her talk about the expectations the Army has for programs like her’s. Her replacement is coming from Germany. I both wonder if he will possess the force of personality to maintain the program and if the program he leaves in Germany will survive his departure.

State of the Arts

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Walking The Oregon High School Arts Beat

June 23, 2010

by:

Joe Patti

Oregon Public Broadcasting recently had an episode their show Arts Beat where they directly addressed the value of arts education in schools. There is also a “sidebar” video of three people talking about how they integrate creativity into their jobs and invite people to talk about what their lives would be like had they not had arts in school.

The science teacher in the main video, Michael Giesen, was the 2008 National Teacher of the Year and you can easily see why based on the way he gets his students acting, moving, drawing/model making and interacting in the process of learning about science. (In case you think music is left out, Giesen and his guitar figure prominently in the lessons.)

There seems to be a disconnect present though. Giesen is rewarded for his creativity up to the national level, but I suspect a teacher trying to initiate such a process from scratch might be told the activities they had the student engaged in were extraneous and consuming time best spent trying to master basic competencies for testing. (Though perhaps not in his school or district.) I am sure Giesen’s students do just fine on the testing because he creates so many powerful associations to the material through all the activities he employs. I just wonder how much latitude a teacher working toward that goal would be provided as they made missteps in the process of refining their approach.

It is the competency requirements that John Baker, the choir director in the second segment of the video feels erodes his program. At one time he had 90 people in his girls choir, now he has 14. He says his principal thinks it is because kids don’t want to sing, but he believes it is that there are so many requirements the students need to fulfill, they have little opportunity to take his class.

His students learn music theory, sight reading, sing in four languages and need to develop critical thinking skills. But all this aside, the video shows the students performing some very interesting looking and sounding pieces. I can’t think but that many students would be at least a little intrigued by the classes. The first reaction I had to the snippet at the beginning of the video was that I didn’t know they had choral pieces like that. There were a few more seconds like it later in the video.

Baker’s fear is that because his program is so strong and winning competitions, no one is paying close attention to how much it is diminishing. He fears that when he retires and people notice the inevitable differences between the new person and the institution of 3 decades, they will attribute the weakness of the program to the unsuitability of his replacement. In fact, Baker seems to believe his position will become part time before he retires.

The last part of the video deals with the lack of funding and time allocated to arts experience in schools. This is a common theme nationwide. What was most interesting about John Baker’s segment was that he didn’t attribute his problems to either of these things. He didn’t talk about his funding being cut or say that the administration was necessarily undermining him.

His problem seems mostly to be due to a shift in values. Either his principal is right and kids don’t want to sing or he is right and required focus of students’ education is moving them away from his program. It is rare to hear of a school arts program in distress due to a philosophical rather than financial shift in priorities. Perhaps it happens more frequently than I realize and it is just the budget cuts getting all the press.

Art(ist) Education

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Info You Can Use: Considerations Before Forming A Non-Profit

June 22, 2010

by:

Joe Patti

Last month, as many non-profits were faced with losing their status due to a change in the tax filing laws, Board Source President/CEO Linda Crompton suggested the situation might be good for the non-profit world by removing duplicative and ineffective/inactive non-profits. Because non-profits really aren’t required to generate a business plan or survey the need and competition before filing for status, she feels there may be too many non-profits in existence.

No for-profit company would start up without doing a thorough analysis of the competitive landscape; that analysis would be baked into the business plan and would inform all other decisions — one of which might be “not here, not now.” It’s incumbent upon our sector to school itself on this point: just because we have an idea, and a mission, and a great, good heart, does not mean that we need to start our own, brand-spanking new organization to fulfill that mission. The same truth applies to organizations in all stages of their lifecycle. Boards should be asking themselves: are we still relevant? Are we fulfilling our mission effectively and sustainably? Is there another organization across town doing the same thing, only better? Should we be discussing merger, or even dissolution?

I have mentioned a number of times over the years that I have often many arts organizations have been started that could have easily been part of an existing group or that could have merged with other groups when it was clear that their service area couldn’t support both groups very well. I will admit that I have seen many more groups in merger talks over the last few years since the economy has gotten worse than I had during previous economic down turns. It was good to see people considering this route. But I have also seen new groups peel off because of personality differences or a desire to perform a slightly different genre. Admittedly there is a difference between classical and modern realism, but Shakespeare festivals manage to produce both without compromising their souls.

To be honest though, I don’t know if the IRS would be in a position to evaluate whether there was or wasn’t a need for any type of non-profit, be it an arts organization or social service agency. Imagine the work involved in developing criteria to measure if there was a sufficient support base for the organization in a community. Imagine the bad press the IRS would get for denying someone non-profit status for a social service organization serving a very emotionally charged cause.

Which doesn’t mean due diligence shouldn’t be done. In a comment to Linda Crompton’s entry, Don Griesmann links to an entry on his blog in which he enumerates all the considerations that should be made before creating a non-profit. He also footnotes his arguments with the largest number of stories on the difficulties faced by non-profit organizations I have ever seen.

His entry came at the end of 2009 and he proposed that no new non-profits should be allowed to be created in 2010 unless a whole multitude of conditions were met. A brief sampling:

•Unless you understand the nonprofit will not be “your nonprofit” and you have enlisted an incorporating board that is interested in the concept and capable of performing the necessary tasks of incorporating and operating the organization and

•Unless you understand there is no “free money” from the federal or state governments. The federal government distributes funds through scholarships, fellowships, contracts, grants and loans. Each requires an application, meeting eligibility requirements, demonstration of a task to be undertaken, proof that the task was performed and the money used appropriately and in many instances a report evaluating the use of their funds…

….•Unless you have a concept of what it costs to develop and operate a nonprofit in terms of shared leadership, time, thought, study, serious planning, hard work, evaluation and annual reporting as well as money and
•Unless you have no intention of attempting to raise more than $5,000 a year for the next 5 years…

…•Unless you have performed due diligence and created a board of mixed talents, diversity, shared passion and vision concerning a truly unserved issue or need supported by some empirical evidence. If the need is an underserved need, why not join with the current providers and increase the service or product? And
•Unless you understand that there simply are not grants available to pay for the incorporation process. If you and others cannot raise the first $1,000 or so to incorporate, then where do you think you will get the money to run the organization? When someone asks, as many do, does anyone know where I can get a grant to start my nonprofit, we should either not respond or tell the truth – you are not ready to start a nonprofit. Go volunteer at a local nonprofit….

One of his next “unless” includes having a business plan that answer 19 different questions. One of his other conditions might be that you shouldn’t form a non-profit if you don’t have the patience to read his whole entry. While it is very long, it asks many pertinent questions and raises many points that ought to be considered. It is good to see people starting to advocate for this level of consideration prior to forming a non-profit.

Of course, non-profit status covers a lot of situations, including block associations and other purposes that wouldn’t necessarily be competing for grants from a shrinking pool of resources. These will certainly benefit from being well planned, but aren’t likely to struggle to stay in existence or become a drain on their community if they don’t meet every criteria.

Boards, Fundraising, Government Relations, Info You Can Use, State of the Arts, Terms and Ideas

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Things To Ponder: Who Is Your CEO?

June 21, 2010

by:

Joe Patti

Gene Takagi at the always enlightening Nonprofit Law Blog links to a two part entry on why the title of the senior leader of a non-profit should transition from Executive Director to President/CEO. The argument made in the pieces is that the person in that position gains credibility within and without of the organization.

Takagi only touches upon this very briefly because his greater concern is who is legally the CEO of the organization, the executive director or board chair. I voraciously consumed the post because I have dealt with organizations where the dynamics were such that one was clearly in a dominant position. I often wondered to whom people would look for leadership in a crisis–versus who was ultimately responsible for the decisions that were made during that time.

Takagi’s advice is-

“However, if the organization has a paid executive director who is tasked with operational leadership and the board chair is a volunteer who is not active in management of the organization’s operations, the CEO designation should be given to the executive director. Nonprofit boards should (1) review their bylaws to understand how their management structures have been established, and (2) amend them, as necessary.”

Acknowledging that the board chair may not want to give up the CEO title in this case, especially if said person is the organization’s founder or the board is very active, Takagi suggests the board seriously think about what is in the best interests of the organization. There are legal repercussions the nominal CEO may face.

It must not be overlooked that whoever has the CEO title may face increased exposure to liability for failure to meet his or her duties. Any CEO should be very familiar with the organization’s current financial position, programs, legal compliance issues, and overall strengths and weaknesses. Imagine a judge’s or jury’s reaction to a CEO who claims not to have reviewed the financials for several months or failed to take any steps to help ensure that the operations of the organization were compliant. Such reaction may be very different if it were the volunteer board chair’s liability that was being considered and the organization had a separate executive director designated as the CEO.

I did a quick read of other sources to see if Directors and Officers Insurance and Errors and Omissions Insurance would cover this sort of negligence and my results were inconclusive. Different insurance companies offer different coverages which contain different exclusions. Some seemed to imply this was the sort of thing you buy the insurance to guard against. Others said the insurance companies will look for any blatant omissions to use as a pretext to deny a claim.

Boards

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