My Davidson | A Student Blog Art After COVID-19

Last summer, I served as the Davidson fellow for Arts+, a nonprofit organization based in Charlotte that works to provide accessible art education to all populations. The organization offers music lessons, visual art workshops for adults, and summer camps in visual art, film and photography, just to name a few. I had a basic understanding of this organization at the start of my internship, but as the summer came to a close, I was able to confidently say that I had witnessed the wide range of Arts+ offerings and their impact.

The goal of most of my projects as an intern was to assist Arts+ in getting back to their status before the pandemic shut everything down, and preparing for their move to a new office and programming space in August 2022. What I mean by the first goal is that I spent a lot of time reaching out to schools and preschools to ask if they would be interested in any of our school-based music or visual arts programs. I also updated our mailing lists with all of the schools and preschools in the greater Charlotte area. With that updated information, Arts+ can now advertise to those schools that their music and visual arts programs are up and running after a hiatus due to the pandemic.

To elaborate on the second goal, Arts+ moved into a new office and programming space in August after their previous space was shut down. The bulk of my summer research was spent looking into new program offerings that Arts+ could jump-start in their new space to bring in more revenue. Some examples I explored with the help of the executive director and the associate executive director were birthday parties, sip and paint, kindermusik, and art-based child care for CMS teacher workdays. I then did market research to find out what prices were competitive for these offerings in Charlotte and how much it would cost Arts+ to put on a comparable event. With this information, I was able to recommend a pricing strategy to the staff at Arts+.

Some of my other more miscellaneous roles at Arts+ included assisting at summer camps when staff members were absent. At these summer camps, I was able to observe the true impact of Arts+. For example, at a film and photography camp for middle school and high school students, I witnessed Charlotte youth producing and editing their own films with incredible technology, which is something I would have loved to do in middle school or high school. That this organization makes those dreams a reality is incredible. Overall, the experience taught me more about the nonprofit world and how many people it takes to make these organizations successful, and their social impact greater.