EVENT: Artists at Work: Integrating Artists and Creative Workers into Workforce Development
The creative sector and its labor force have been among the hardest hit by the pandemic, nationally and in Illinois. What are paths forward for immediate recovery and longer-term policy changes to help creative workers throughout Illinois? This public event will discuss vital aspects of how workforce policy works at the federal, state, and local level; what programs already exist that the arts can connect into; and ways to address immediate recovery needs and longer-term policy changes to bolster Illinois’ creative workforce.
Tuesday, February 8, 2022
Noon–1pm, online via Zoom
Speakers:
- Claire Rice, Executive Director, Arts Alliance Illinois
- Julio Rodriguez, Deputy Director at the Office of Employment and Training (OET) within the Illinois Department of Commerce & Economic Opportunity (DCEO)
Co-Hosts/Moderators:
- Dr. Andrew Greenlee, Associate Professor & Associate Head, Department of Urban and Regional Planning, College of Fine & Applied Arts
- Dr. Jennifer Novak-Leonard, Research Associate Professor & Research Director, Arts Impact Initiative, College of Fine & Applied Arts
Claire Rice is the Executive Director of Arts Alliance Illinois, a statewide service and advocacy organization that champions arts-supportive policies and funding opportunities to benefit all Illinois residents. Under her leadership, the Alliance recently received a nonprofit innovation award for their work managing the $8 million Arts for Illinois Relief Fund, a public-private partnership between the State of Illinois, City of Chicago, private philanthropy, and grassroots donors supporting the arts community in response to COVID-19.
Julio Rodriguez has been working in the field of human services for the last thirty plus years at the senior management level, and currently manages many of the Illinois programs related to the federal Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) that relate most directly to possible creative worker funding.
This research and panel are funded in part through the University of Illinois System’s Presidential Initiative: Expanding the Impact of the Arts and the Humanities.
Links Featured in the Discussion
Bigelow is a recent graduate of the doctoral program in Educational Leadership at DePaul University. As a poet and educator, Bigelow brings expertise in research about educational programming and pedagogy in the arts with the unique perspective of being both a creator and educator. Bigelow’s work as a postdoctoral fellow will focus on analysis and interpretation of data from the Strategic National Arts Alumni Project (SNAAP), an institutional partner of the College of Fine and Applied Arts. This new role will allow Bigelow the opportunity to continue studying the impact of the arts, artists, and art education, with a focus on advancing research and innovative methods to guide arts practice and policy.
Dr. Jennifer Novak-Leonard, an Urban and Regional Planning professor and research director of FAA’s Arts Impact Initiative, along with co-PI Dr. Rachel Skaggs, Arts Management professor at The Ohio State University, received a National Endowment for the Arts research grant. The grant will be used to examine the experiences of artists and arts alumni regarding racial inclusion in higher education and the impacts of the pandemic. Their research will generate a suite of reports examining the careers and lives of arts and design alumni, with emphasis on experiences of racial inclusion in higher education and impacts of the pandemic. The reports, utilizing the 2022 SNAAP data, will offer data-driven insights for policymakers, researchers, workforce experts, institutions, future arts and design students, and alumni to better understand the contemporary status of arts and design alumni.
A new study is the first to look at how perceptions of artists in local communities affect opinions toward public funding for artists. The study was led by Urban and regional planning professor Jennifer Novak-Leonard, who is the research director of the Arts Impact Initiative for the College of Fine and Applied Arts.
The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has awarded a three-year grant of $650,000 to Arts + Design Alumni Research, a nonprofit that manages the Strategic National Arts Alumni Project (SNAAP). The Mellon funding will enable SNAAP to plan and administer a 2022 national survey of arts alumni and support new collaborative partnerships and a more inclusive survey administration. Dr. Jennifer Novak-Leonard, research associate professor with the Department of Urban and Regional Planning at the U of I, will serve as SNAAP’s research director.