A Holiday Message From ATA Executive Director, Dale Davis

A Holiday Message From ATA Executive Director, Dale Davis

On Friday, November 20 the National Endowment for the Arts presented a live webcast on http://www.arts.gov of a forum about America's artists and other cultural workers who are part of this country's real economy. Academics, foundation professionals, and service organization representatives came together to discuss improving the collection and reporting of statistics about arts and cultural workers, and to develop future research agendas and approaches. The agenda http://arts.endow.gov/news/news09/cultural-workforce-forum.html

The Archive will be available on arts.gov this week.

Today Ian D. Moss blogged on Fractured Atlas on the NEA Cultural Workforce Forum:

"The format was more academic research conference than industry gathering; each of the three “panels” actually consisted of a 10-minute presentation from each participant followed by a Q&A period at the end. The primary discussion took place among the invited researchers and several other guests granted spaces at a very large U-shaped table setup, but Sunil Iyengar, who ran the show for the NEA,made sure to solicit regular questions from the 30-40 onlookers aswell. The panelists hailed from a mix of academic institutions and nonprofit organizations of various types, though curiously only one, Ann Markusen, was from west of the Mississippi (and she made it byless than a mile)."

He highlighted some facts, including:

"We also had Nick Rabkin talking about his research on teaching artists. Quoting Eric Booth, he said that teaching artists are “experts in the verbs of art” - the process, rather than the product.

His survey showed that:

50% of teaching artists had a master’s degree or higher, and a majority worked for nonprofit arts organizations. Half of respondents had over a decade of experience. The median compensation was $35/hr, but the number of paid hours was not that high.

Median total personal income was $36,200, while the median income from teaching was just $17,850. 20% had no health benefits. On the other hand, they love teaching and see it as a calling."

When we take a close look at all the above, what is the message Teaching Artists are receiving? I would love to hear from you on this?

ATA's survey Teaching Artists and Their Work http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=F_2bJJwetasGgrnMZUcqQ99g_3d_3d clearly demonstrates Teaching Artists know what is necessary for the work of Teaching Artists to become sustainable. If you have not taken the survey, please do.

How many roads must Teaching Artists walk down http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DFvkhzkS4bw

Happy Thanksgiving!

Dale Davis
Executive Director
The Association of Teaching Artists

ddavis@teachingartists.com