On-the-ground
Here Anusha Mohan shares her experience supporting creative pathways through her position as Research and Project Manager in Arts and Culture at WolfBrown. Anusha supports several projects at WolfBrown in both quantitative and qualitative data management, tracking, and reporting. In Summer 2024, she worked as the Site Contact and City Observer for the Bloomberg Arts Internship at their sites in Boston and Philadelphia. There, she was in charge of roster and data management, collection, and evaluation tracking. If you have questions about her evaluation activities throughout the program, you can find her email on her team page.
By Anusha Mohan
Over the years, the BAI program has developed a community among practitioners and partners to share best practices. In 2012, the BAI program model was pioneered in New York City by partnering with the arts education organization, Studio in a School, to enroll rising high school juniors from career and technical high schools in a paid internship hosted by one of the city’s cultural institutions.
Since that initial summer, the program has evolved to include a work placement, supplemented with classroom learning with goals to support interns’ development of workplace and communication skills, and group visits to local colleges and arts organizations. Additionally, BAI is expanding to include internships for BAI alumni who are now in college (rising juniors, seniors, or 2024 graduates) in any of the current BAI cities.
The program is currently expanding and include the following internship locations and partners:
- In 2015, the program expanded to Philadelphia with the Greater Philadelphia Cultural Alliance (GPCA) as the local partner.
- In 2017, it expanded to Baltimore with Young Audiences Maryland (now Arts for Learning Maryland) as the local partner.
- In 2019, it expanded to Boston with EdVestors as the local partner.
- In 2022, it expanded to Washington, D.C. with Sitar Arts Center as the local partner.
- In 2024, it expanded to Detroit and New Orleans with Culture Source and KIDsmART as the local partners in their respective cities.
Since 2012, the program has supported over 1,700 internships at more than 250 cultural organizations across seven cities including Boston.
In July and August 2024, I traveled to Boston as part of my role as Research and Project Manager in Arts and Culture at WolfBrown to connect with EdVestors in support of our national evaluation of the Bloomberg Arts Internship (BAI) program. In addition to observing college preparedness and professional preparedness workshops, I interviewed worksite supervisors and BAI interns at various worksites throughout Boston. At worksites, interns learn key transferable skills, forge important connections, and gain valuable experience that sets them up for success in their future career pathways.
For many interns, pursuing a career in the arts industry full time proves to be challenging due to the cost of training, uncertainty of employment, and the social capital it takes to get showcased or hired. A spotlight into this uncertainty is exemplified by the research conducted by Netflix and the National Youth Theatre who found that 89% of parents from diverse socioeconomic backgrounds would advise their children against pursuing a career in the film and television industry because of the perception that it is not a sustainable career. More “traditional” professions in law, medicine, and finance were seen as a safer and more attractive route for young people (Source: The Guardian).
But young people want creative lives. For many, their creative lives will have to be hybrid—they will combine artistic work with other kinds of work. But, too often, opportunities and paths are siloed; a major in theater rarely trains you for managing a company or marketing.
If we want the arts and culture to be more diverse, we must provide learning, internships, and work schedules that acknowledge and honor this hybrid engagement. This is what BAI provides, which may be one of its greatest strengths.
Worksite Visits: Insights and Experiences
In Boston, I visited Inquilinos Boricuas en Acción (IBA), Artward Bound at the Massachusetts College of Art and Design (MassArt), and the North End Music & Performing Arts Center (NEMPAC). Below are a few snapshots and samples of work from interns across these worksites.
Inquilinos Boricuas en Acción (IBA)
Inquilinos Boricuas en Acción empowers and engages individuals and families to improve their lives through high-quality, affordable housing, education, and arts programs. The Youth Development Program provides opportunities for youth to explore their identity and culture, tell their stories, and develop positive relationships with peers and adults. During their daily workshops, they focus on arts enrichment, civic engagement, academic support, financial empowerment, and job readiness. I connected with Sandra Soto, Youth Development Program Director, and an intern, who completed an art piece that showcases her identity and what she identifies as home.
Massachusetts College of Art and Design (MassArt)
MassArt was founded in 1873 and is a bold, comprehensive art and design institution that spans 18 undergraduate and nine graduate programs, certificates, continuing education, and post-baccalaureate study. Artward Bound is a free, four-year college prep program for Boston high school students interested in a college education focused on art and design. Students participate in art classes, career workshops, academic tutoring, visits to museums and artist studios, and more. Artward Bound students are immersed in six weeks of artmaking and academics each summer on MassArt’s campus. I connected with Greg Linse, JET Digital Media Designer/Learning Coordinator, and two interns who worked together to complete a digital brochure promoting the final celebration of the summer internship in Boston and take photos during classes at MassArt.
North End Music and Performing Arts Center (NEMPAC)
NEMPAC is a robust and thriving non-profit community music school and performing arts center in downtown Boston. I connected with both Will Neely, Marketing and Communications Manager, and an intern who worked with Will. The intern worked to design program flyers for the adult music programs and to promote the Jazz in the Park summer concert series through outreach in the community.
Key Takeaways from the BAI Program
Through these worksite visits and speaking with interns and supervisors, I gained insight into the daily lives of interns in the BAI program over the summer, and the crucial transferable skills they learned, including oral and written communication skills, working in a professional team setting, and developing agency, confidence, and persistence in the workplace. Interns cited the experience as being pivotal in helping them for their future post-secondary goals whether that looks like pursuing a degree in college or securing a job in their desired field.
Interns in the BAI summer program in Boston centered the importance of mental health and self-care in their worksite portfolios and showcased the development of their professional, creative, and personal identities. In an interview with an intern at IBA, she mentioned that the program “really prides themselves on mental health and self-care…and want you to put yourself first… it’s really helpful to know because you gotta put ‘you’ first.”
Additionally, EdVestors and the BAI program staff hosted an arts and cultural panel where intersectional career professionals with jobs or career interests in both the arts industry and non-arts industries spoke to interns about how they balance having multiple careers and creative pursuits. Some staff in the program also continue to engage in the arts industry outside of their profession. The same intern spoke to the impact of the program, she mentioned that “it really impacts my view on the arts industry itself… my ideal profession has definitely changed plenty of times while I’ve been here… when I first came here, I was, like, interested in screen writing, and then I wanted to do architecture, and I was like, that’s a lot of school… so I was like, interior design. But now I’m kind of leading away from that because I don’t know if that’s what I want to do just yet. A lot of the staff at BAI, they were actors or are still acting, so it’s very inspiring to see and to know that we have something in common, and that’s another part of networking that I can always use.”
Celebrating Success and Looking Ahead
Throughout the program, interns received the opportunity to network with their peers, BAI staff, and members of the Boston community at various arts and cultural institutions in many capacities. It was truly a valuable and unique experience that I enjoyed being a part of this summer. As a new resident to Boston, I learned alongside BAI interns about the arts and cultural activities and institutions (and how to commute to these places in a punctual manner) in Boston.
At the end of the program, I had the privilege of attending the final celebration hosted by EdVestors at the Berklee College of Music during which interns showcased portfolios and presentations of their work across worksites. I am pictured in the first picture at the top of this page, along with LaVonia Montoute, Senior Director of Career Pathways, and Jeremy Gooden, Manager of Internship and Programs, during the showcase portion of the celebration.
The Bloomberg Arts Internship currently operates in seven cities across the country. WolfBrown has been their evaluation partner since 2017. Learn more about the work here.
About Our Work and Our Collaborators
About Arts for Learning Maryland
Arts for Learning is a nonprofit organization devoted to enriching the lives and education of Maryland’s youth through educational and culturally diverse arts programs. Through Arts for Learning, professional teaching artists from all disciplines partner with educators, schools, and school districts to provide, on average, over 300,000 hours of learning in, through, and about the arts to more than 185,000 Maryland students annually.
Arts for Learning is a mission-driven organization that values community, innovation, and passion. Their staff, board, and teaching artists have a shared commitment to advance equity in the field of education by working tirelessly to generate opportunities for students to imagine, create, and realize their full potential through the arts.
About EdVestors
EdVestors is a school improvement organization that combines strategic investments, content expertise, and collaborative implementation to drive system-level impact in Boston schools. Since 2002, EdVestors has raised and invested over $42 million in school improvement efforts.
EdVestors drives toward their mission by activating people and resources; learning and iterating in context; and influencing system change. They believe that continuously attending to all three of their drivers ensures their activities will create impact.
About CultureSource
CultureSource is a member association for non-profit arts and cultural organizations in Southeast Michigan serving Wayne, Oakland, Macomb, Washtenaw, Livingston, Monroe, and St. Clair counties. As a regional service organization, they do this work through hosting professional development workshops that grow creative and leadership capacities, presenting programs that provide space for exchanging ideas about arts and culture, and leading initiatives that bring together stakeholders interested in the public accessing creative expression.
Founded in 2007 as the Cultural Alliance of Southeastern Michigan, on January 1, 2013, they became CultureSource, the source for arts and culture in Southeast Michigan. With its establishment, CultureSource filled a void that major organizations identified in the region based on shared needs for capacity building, advocacy, and marketing resources, welcoming small and mid-size organizations into the conversation. Quickly, CultureSource grew from 32 member organizations to 72, now serving over 170 annually. In 2022 CultureSource acquired the national arts consulting nonprofit EmcArts, with the aim of incorporating their unique models of adaptive changemaking into their programmatic offering.
About KIDsmART
For 25 years, KIDsmART has passionately addressed a critical problem: the limited access to high-quality arts education for children in New Orleans. In that time, they have impacted over 60,000 children and 11,000 educators in the New Orleans community and beyond through arts-integrated teaching, learning, and thought leadership.
About Studio Institute
Studio in a School‘s mission is grounded in a commitment to equity and access. In 1977, when drastic budget cuts virtually eliminated the arts from New York City public schools, Studio’s founders devised a strategy to restore visual arts instruction by engaging professional artists to support teachers in public schools.
In 2017, after 40 years of experience and success, the Studio Institute was created to expand their reach and bring their programs to schools, community-based organizations, and arts and cultural institutions beyond New York City.
About Greater Philadelphia Cultural Alliance (GPCA)
Since 1972, the Greater Philadelphia Cultural Alliance (GPCA) have played a key role in ensuring the health and vitality of arts and culture in Greater Philadelphia. In 1991, they helped establish the Philadelphia Cultural Fund (PCF); In 2008, they worked to re-establish a stronger Office of Arts, Culture, and the Creative Economy (OACCE); In 2009, they led the successful statewide battle to defeat the proposed “arts tax”; and in 2014, we successfully advocated for increasing the budget for PCF grantmaking programs, including restoring Youth Arts Enrichment Grants which provide project support for arts-education programs serving K-12 students in the Philadelphia School District.
The Cultural Alliance leads, strengthens, and amplifies the voices of more than 400 member organizations that generate over $4.1 billion in economic impact for the region. Their members, as well as the cultural community as a whole, count on the Alliance for signature research reports on the health and growth of the sector; grantmaking in partnership with the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts; robust professional development and membership services; marketing and audience development through their signature consumer marketing programs, Phillyfunguide.com and Funsavers; and leadership in policy and community engagement through their advocacy initiatives.
About Sitar Arts Center
Sitar Arts Center engages D.C. youth, from early childhood to young adulthood, in building a creative community of learning and belonging that removes financial and cultural barriers to arts education and career training. They provide affordable, high-quality education and workforce development in the visual, digital, and performing arts. Each semester, 80% of students are from D.C. households at 60% or less of the area median income. Programs take place year-round during out-of-school time in Sitar’s state-of-the-art facilities.
This post is a part of the On-the-ground focus of our Amplifying Creative Opportunities newsletter. This new feature will profile programs with which we work. To read previous posts from our newsletter, please visit the links below to read Re-tooling the Trade-themed posts.
In this post, Kathleen Hill reviews her use of “ant trails,” one of the most common observational tools in museum studies. She explores what they make visible and the assumptions that underlie them.
In this post, Tom Wolf discusses the need to re-think the interview process by leaving behind the search for a “good match” and instead emphasizing the search for a good partner.
