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Covid-19: Hard Times and Hope for Arts for Learning

April 22, 2020 By Cindy Sherwood

Virginia’s stay-at-home order has changed all of our lives, in many different ways. For Arts for Learning, the impact has been profound.

For students who love our programs, there’s great disappointment. Sixth-grader Myla Stith can’t play the violin this spring because the Strings Impact program was canceled. “I was hoping I could get really good. After all these years, I wanted to show what I could do, so I’m pretty sad about it.”

The Rhythm and Me adaptive dance program was cut short for kids like Naomi Morgan, a fourth-grader with autism spectrum disorder. “She was getting the dance steps down, she was having a ball, she was having fun,” says her mother, Monica Morgan. “It was sad it ended so abruptly because she was really getting into it.”

It’s hard times for many artists on our roster too. “As a fulltime storyteller, with my backup job being substitute teaching, I’m completely out of work at this point,” says Via Goode, A4L teaching artist. Via is one of 38 teaching artists on our roster who are losing more than $42,000 in income because of program cancellations that have affected more than 16,000 students and 2,800 educators.

Strings Impact
Rhythm & Me
Teaching Artist, Via Goode

As a nonprofit organization, Arts for Learning is hurting. We don’t receive money from programs when schools are shut down. And that means we’ve lost tens of thousands of dollars that we need to keep our nonprofit afloat—money that we use to pay our artists and staff, our rent and electric bill, and everything else that keeps our business running.

Our artists and our staff have stepped up to create Take 10, new digital programming for home-schooling students that’s both fun and educational. It’s also a way for us to offer small amounts of pay to our participating artists. But here’s the problem—we don’t receive any money for producing Take 10. Since it brings in zero revenue to Arts for Learning, we can’t keep on doing it without new funding.

That’s why we need YOUR help. We want to keep providing arts education to Virginia’s kids, but we can’t do it alone. Any amount helps—will you give $10 to Take Ten? Use this link—all donations are tax deductible.

Filed Under: ArtsEd Tagged With: 757 arts, 757 nonprofit, arts education, Arts for Learning, arts integration, arts programs, arts-in-education, autism spectrum disorder, Covid-19, creative learning, dance, digital arts, Hampton City Schools, home-schooling, music, Newport News Public Schools, nonprofit, Norfolk Public Schools, pandemic, Portsmouth Public Schools, Rhythm and Me, storyteller, Strings Impact, Take 10, Take Ten, teaching artists, Via Goode, violins, Virginia Beach City Public Schools, Virginia stay-at-home order, virtual learning

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