Magical Grant Papers

OH HEY THERE, I forgot I have a blog now. Here's me with my magical grant binders. On my right, papers having to do with following up on the Our Town grant that Sitka received in 2011. More on that in a minute. On my left is all of the paperwork for the ArtWorks education grant that I'm in charge of.

Let me talk for a second about grant writing. This is something that I have some experience in (written some grants, awarded a few, took a class, completed two internships for grant writing), but I'm still feeling like I'm just getting started. I have mixed feelings about writing grants, which is what I can only assume is what ALL people who write grants experience.

1) I love writing. I love working with non-profits. The people you meet are usually incredibly talented, passionate, and willing to do just about anything for their coworkers and the people they serve in the community. I love getting involved with organizations that do meaningful work. It's great! As a type-A, detail-oriented, deadline-driven person, it's also great for me mentally.

2) There's a lot of unexpected pressure involved. Beyond the obvious deadlines and proofreading and dotting i's and crossing t's, if you're doing things right (or maybe this is just me?!) there's probably going to be some sort of emotional investment in the organization you're working with. There's a reason that these places exist, often a very inspiring reason to boot, and as I'm working on a project, I get this feeling that says, "Don't mess this up. You mess this up, this place doesn't get funding, kids can't go to arts camp or people don't have access to these services or high schoolers will never learn about small-scale sustainable farming and it will be all your fault."

It's only partly true. The other thing about grant writing is that funding is becoming more competitive. Private donors and corporate gifts are diminishing with the sagging economy, so more organizations are turning to local, regional, and federal grant-making organizations to pick up the difference. At the same time, budgets for those government offices and private foundations are being slashed, so you've got more people going for a smaller pot... Which is why I feel so driven when I'm working on grant packages. It's an important aspect of nonprofit-ing!

Roger (the executive director and I) have had several conversations about this since the camp has been applying for and earning NEA grants for so long. His take on it is in line with his ideas about seemingly everything: Do everything you do to the greatest extent, act knowing that you've done so to the best of your ability, and that you've done everything you can. Then, it's not up to you, it's up to everyone else involved.

Any mixed feelings aside, I do feel as though I'm doing rewarding work. I'm happy that I'm getting the chance to teach a little bit while I'm here (middle school brass players FOR THE WIN!) because it makes my soul feel good. I think I get depressed (and rusty) when I go too long without teaching someone or learning something. 

Anyway...the writing is going well, as is the teaching. I'm having a great time getting to know all of the wonderful faculty who are here, and getting to work with my sister some is really fun, too!

I mentioned the Our Town grant at the top of this post, and I wanted to mention it really quickly. Our Town is a grant from the NEA that works for art-based transformation of a city or town. The idea is to bring a community together through a variety of events and create a cultural hub. This is a fantastic idea for Sitka, where a lot of great organizations exist under separate roofs but have never really collaborated, and there are many bright people with brilliant ideas. Enter Sitka Fest.

The cover features some Alaska Native art as well as my new good friend WT McRae (NY based clown, educator, and physical theater enthusiast, look him up!). Sitka Fest joins the Sitka Fine Arts Camp, Sheldon Jackson Museum, Sitka Sound Science Center, Sitka Summer Music Festival, Native Jazz Workshop, Island Institute, Seafood Festival, Sitka Fellows (which brings emerging multi-disciplinary talents from across the US to Sitka for a residency and community brainstorming sesh), and finally, a TEDx event, which I'm really excited for at the end of July and I'm sure you'll be hearing more about it. I've seen some of this stuff take place already, and I can tell you that it's incredible to see the greater community come together to work on these projects. Not only that, but it's bringing in visitors from across Alaska and out of state. Roger is, ideally, looking to create an "Aspen" or a "Tanglewood," right here in Alaska, where communities are vibrant and natural resources are plentiful,  but cultural resources are hard to come by in the small, isolated, rural communities that make up most of Alaska.

I'm really looking forward to seeing how Sitka Fest and Sitka as a "destination" continue to grow and shape the community. I'm happy to be part of it, and I hope I'm headed in the right direction with my work and my writing!

Adventuring Update

My weekend:

Swam in the icy cold Pacific, hung out with my sister, and took advantage of the stunning weather by climbing a mountain. No big deal. 

JUST KIDDING IT IS A BIG DEAL, LOOK AT ME I'M JUMPING ON A MOUNTAIN!

Good life choices. 

Not Your Typical Summer Camp

I attended summer camp twice, although I suppose you could argue that I went six times if you include the band camps I participated in as a student. That's an entirely different animal from the type of camp you go to if you're looking for the kind of experience all of your eleven year-old friends will be jealous of when you tell them stories of horseback riding and sailboating and campfires, however, we'll count those week-long stints for the sake of calling it a formative experience. This is not your typical camp experience - however if I were 11 and my best friend came home from camp and told me about what she did during the summer, I would be very, very jealous.

Can't beat the view!

I'm here in Sitka, a place that I never could have imagined spending a summer, and it's amazing to see the students, counselors, and faculty who are involved with this camp. There are kids here who, as middle schoolers, are in their third, fourth, fifth year with the camp. Some of them are from Sitka, so they've been involved with the camp in some capacity for a decade or more - literally, parents taking infants to the nightly Art Shares. There are also kids who have never left their villages of fewer than 500 people until this camp, kids from out of state, kids who are here to focus on one discipline, and kids who are sampling five radically different classes. Kids who have never painted before next to kids whose work is hanging in the statehouse, kids who have been dancing their whole lives partnering with kids who had previously been told (I kid you not, unfortunately) that they don't have the body to be a dancer. 

And you know what? Every last kid is having a fantastic time. Every last kid is making friends, smiling in class, learning things they didn't expect to learn, and talking voraciously every time I ask them what they did yesterday or what they're working on. I've never seen anything like it. 

Part of my job is gathering data about the camp, then putting it into words and work samples so that grantmaking organizations (read: the NEA) come to know and understand what it is that makes Sitka Fine Arts Camp so incredible. It's funny, because in my interviews in Cleveland and over the phone with Roger (director of the camp), from my research on the website, and in talking to people even remotely associated, you get the feeling that this place is some sort of haven. Like you can't even begin to imagine how incredible this camp is. Take the quote from the home page, for example: "I spend 50 weeks out of the year wishing I were at camp. The other two I relish!" When I read that, I thought to myself, No way, no way is that a kid saying that. I'm sure camp is great and it's clever marketing, but it can't be that great, can it? 

After spending some time here, I've realized that that comment is genuine, and this place really is all that great. I wish I had come to Fine Arts Camp! A smattering of the courses available in the middle school session should help you understand what I mean: Guitar Knuckle Busters, African Dance, ballet, partner acrobatics, watercolor painting, thrown pottery, orchestra, Athabaskan beading, modern dance, drawing fantasy creatures, B&W photo, fantastic fiction. Yes, you can take all of that. As a 12 year old. There are over 60 classes for the middle school session, each as bad ass as those, and watching the kids in their classes is the best part of my job. I'm watching teachable moments happen, I'm watching kids grow from shy and unsure to confident and creative and committed! They proudly wear clothes from the camp store stamped with the artist print on it, and think of themselves accordingly. The teachers (OH THE TEACHERS!) are all about process vs. product and experiencing risks and trusting your instinct and the students buy into it 110%. As a result, campers are lovely, creative, reflective, and caring human beings. We need more of this. 

Ta-da!

I'm also continually stunned with the quality of the people who teach here. This is not your run-of-the-mill summer camp. We are talking serious talent. University professors and traveling freelancers and passionate teaching artists and people who have FAN CLUBS (one of the visual arts teachers designed the Magic: The Gathering cards) and they are awesome. Take a look at the site to read some bios. They're even more impressive in person, PLUS they're easy to work with and love what they're doing. 

My kind of people! The other interesting factor is that you've got counselors and faculty sitting in on other classes and participating because they love learning and want to learn new things. The kids see their mentors taking risks and trying new things, and in turn, the kids are more willing to jump when a teacher says "jump."

African drumming class

I'm lucky in that I'm also co-teaching the brass masterclass during this middle school session. The other instructor (who is a crazy-talented, multi-dimensional, mostly-jazz artist based out of NY) does most of the work (which is mostly by ear...interesting), but for the first half of the 80 minute class, I take the low brass. We do warm-ups, fundamentals, fun experimental things, and talk about playing brass instruments. There's a guy named George Jones who will be attending Oberlin for trombone in the fall, and he's been helping out and sitting in. He's from Sitka, is a former camper, and is also great to work with! It's nice to be teaching, especially in an atmosphere like this, ESPECIALLY when you get to see the kids for such long stretches of time, every single day. You can get a lot done. 

Needless to say, I'm having a good time and enjoying the experience. The work is challenging but fun, and although the weather is pretty yucky and changes at the drop of a hat (definitely not the type of person who enjoys mid 40s and rain in the summer!) it's worth it.

Liminality and Socks

This blog has been brewing for quite a while. I'm in a period of (what feels like) colossal and rapid change, so it seems appropriate to actually start this now. A close friend and mentor introduced me to the word "liminal" about four months ago, which I realized completely described what I was feeling.

lim·i·nal/ˈlimənl/

Adjective:

Of or relating to a transitional or initial stage of a process. Occupying a position at, or on both sides of, a boundary or threshold.

That pretty much summed up "Spring Semester 2012," otherwise known as my first six months post-Graduate school. My life was truly in a liminal state at that point. I spent those months substitute teaching, working for my alma mater, juggling two or three additional part-time gigs, and fretting (freaking out) about - literally - where in the world my partner (B) and I would be in six months. After aiding me in the discovery of the perfect word, my mentor basically told me to 1) Stop freaking out, 2) Trust in my abilities, and 3) Relish in the flexibility and insecurities of liminality. 

NB: I should note that although I didn't achieve this completely, I definitely became less of a crazy person. Having a descriptive word for what I was feeling certainly gave me the power to better cope with the situation.

Sometime in March, we received word that B got into just about every graduate program he applied to; the continent was our oyster. All that was left was to decide where we would be moving, which turned out to be a more difficult task than either one of us was expecting. Later that month I received two different offers for summer positions: One that could have extended my current position, would have put us financially in the black and was a safe and familiar choice; and one working for a non-profit (read: not exactly a money maker) which would put me on the opposite side of the country for six weeks but was a definite step-up in jobs and was just the type of thing I was looking for. 

Well, liminal no more, I (we!) have a plan.

Yesterday I left my home of five years - good old Oberlin - and my job of four years, to begin a new adventure. Today I'm off to Alaska to start my summer position as the Grants Coordinator for the Sitka Fine Arts Camp. In August, Team GB will be moving to Montreal! We've been incredibly fortunate in our experiences up to this point, thanks in part to our network of supportive family and friends, and part to Oberlin. We've been in Oberlin for five years, so this will be a big change for both of us, but we're excited!

I've started this blog as a way to chronicle my transitions in and out of liminality, our adventures beyond the beloved greens of Tappan Square, and some of the daily goings-on for the sake of my out-of-region friends and family.

A note about "Always Pack Extra Socks." I recently went on a short weekend trip which I thought I had packed for thoroughly. Turns out I had forgotten socks. Even though it was late spring/summer and socks weren't exactly a necessity, it was still a major bummer to get there and discover that I had forgotten such a key item. In preparing for this trip to Alaska, I made a big purchase of all new socks, some of which have lifetime warranties (I know, I didn't know warranties existed for socks either!). First of all, great decision - these socks are the best - but I also think these lifetime warranties are perfectly symbolic of the journey I've embarked on, and I'm looking forward to wearing these things to the fullest on my impending adventures!