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Happy LGBTQ+ Pride Month!
This month, we convened researchers, funders, and practitioners for LA County Arts and Health Week, rolled out a new Arts and Culture department logo, launched more Arts Internship positions, released a program evaluation of the Creative Wellbeing initiative, and have an opportunity for organizations with creative career programs to add your listing to Creative Careers Online—you can explore these updates below.
I also want to celebrate several accomplishments receiving attention this month. The National Association of Counties (NACo) is dedicated to the advancement of excellence in public service, and annually, NACo recognizes new and exceptional government programs from counties across the nation. We are so excited to win six achievement awards this year, for artist Phung Huynh’s work with Office of Immigrant Affairs in our Creative Strategist program; Phung’s work (again!) on our Civic Art Division’s community engagement-rich commission of her artwork Sobrevivir at the Los Angeles General Medical Center; the Countywide Cultural Policy and two projects that came from it, the Arts and Culture Needs Assessment and County of Los Angeles Land Acknowledgment and Toolkit developed with Los Angeles City/County Native American Indian Commission and Tribal members; and the aforementioned Creative Wellbeing initiative. Kudos to all the Arts and Culture staff, partners, artists, Commissioners, funders, and Board supporting this award-winning work!
I believe all six can serve as models for the role of arts as key to civic life—for other agencies’ practices and programs, and I am so proud of our staff for this well-deserved recognition.
Onward!
Kristin Sakoda |
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Just Published!
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Creative Wellbeing Second Evaluation Report
We engaged Harder+Company Community Research to do a second evaluation of the Creative Wellbeing approach. Originally created collaboratively by our Arts Education and Youth Development staff, with partners at the County’s Office of Child Protection, Department of Mental Health, and community-based partners Arts for Healing and Justice Network, Creative Wellbeing is a non-traditional arts-based approach to mental health to support young people. In it, we engage arts partners to provide healing centered arts education to systems-impacted and foster youth along with arts-based professional development for the adults who care for them—social workers, educators, and more.
The Harder+Company evaluation found that:
- Youth participants experienced positive social-emotional benefits while also exploring their interests, building technical art skills, and increasing their access to the arts,
- Teaching artists in the program make students feel comfortable, included, and safe to express themselves freely and make mistakes,
- Adult participants learned about using arts to support youth and heal themselves as well, and
- Larger-scale systems change is beginning to take place through the participating departments, organizations, and individuals in the program.
The report concludes with recommendations for how to continue to improve the program. The first Creative Wellbeing evaluation report can be found on our website, along with more resources for implementing and evaluating healing-informed arts education. |
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In Case You Missed It!
East LA Landscape by Star Montana at the Los Angeles General Medical Center - Recuperative Care Center |
'Turning Workforce Demographics into Meaningful Change'
On May 29, our research partner SMU DataArts held a webinar, Embracing Inclusion: Turning Workforce Demographics into Meaningful Change, where they took a deeper dive into the 2023 Los Angeles County Arts and Culture Workforce Demographics Study. The webinar featured a presentation of findings from this new research, a moderated panel discussion, and breakout groups where participants discussed how they can activate these insights for meaningful change. Some key questions that emerged during the webinar:
- How can smaller-budget organizations attract and retain talent, especially while the arts and culture sector is still rebuilding from the pandemic?
- What can we do as individual organizations and as a sector to address the arts and culture career opportunity gap for Latinx workers?
- How can we reduce systemic burnout on the career path and increase a sense of belonging and inclusion in decision making, especially for supervisory workers?
- How can organizational transparency support and nurture diversity, equity, and inclusion in arts organizations?
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Final Round of 2024 Internships To be Posted July 1
Interns attend the 2016 Arts Internship Summit. |
We are pleased to announce that the fourth (and final) round of positions for the 2024 Arts Internship Program are now available! This program has been open since April 1, and will provide 228 university and community college students with paid on-the-job experience in the arts at over 160 nonprofit organizations across the LA region. What's more, all Arts Internship Program internships provide 400 hours of work experience at $17.28 an hour.
If you know an interested student (or students), please let them know to visit our website for the first group of available positions. Students will apply directly to the host organizations via the information found on our website. |
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Become a Creative Career Pathways Community Partner
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Do you represent a community-based organization, nonprofit, educational institution, or an employer that offers career exploration programs, apprenticeships, fellowships, or internships for creative careers?
Become a Creative Career Pathways Community Partner and post your program's information to Creative Careers Online (CCO) to reach a wider audience and enhance your impact.
CCO is a leading career navigation tool designed to inspire youth from all backgrounds to discover, prepare for, and pursue creative career pathways. CCO is part of the Los Angeles County Arts Ed Collective and is developed by Gladeo in partnership with Create CA, Los Angeles County Department of Arts and Culture, and the Snap Foundation. More information can be found at creativecareers.gladeo.org
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Creative Careers Online is a career navigation tool designed to inspire youth from all backgrounds to discover, prepare for, and pursue creative career pathways. CCO is part of the Los Angeles County Department of Arts and Culture's Creative Career Pathways for Youth program. Part of the Cultural Equity and Inclusion Initiative (CEII) and guided by Building Creative Career Pathways for Youth: A Field Scan for LA County, Creative Career Pathways for Youth focuses on building pathways for youth who have historically experienced barriers to employment and are often unaware of creative careers, earning potential, arts education programs, and work-based learning opportunities. This program aims to reduce barriers and change perceptions, ensuring all youth have equitable access to creative jobs and careers in LA County. |
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New Department Logo
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Allow us to reintroduce ourselves with a new logo! After more than 75 years of service to LA County arts and culture, most recently as the Arts Commission and then in 2019 as the first-ever Department of Arts and Culture, it was time to freshen up our brand. We thank the firm TaskForce for their partnership on this project—which involved researching the local, national, and global arts field, engaging our staff and colleagues to prioritize the values our department’s brand ought to convey, and then creating guidelines to steer our brand in the years to come.
The new logo is available to download on our website—please use it going forward! |
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IN BRIEF
- Check out the LA36 video on the inaugural LA County Employee Wellness, Arts, and Culture Festival, the idea for which came from our Creative Strategist christy roberts berkowitz and her work during a residency with the Department of Human Resources. Even if you did not attend, you can still benefit from the arts with a very special digital project, also created by christy. From the Stars to My Center – A Wellness Journal, allows to you explore mindfulness and movement, learning and curiosity about the arts, music, restaurants, and more, and invites you to be inspired by your own creative expression.
- The Beverly Press covered Supervisor Solis’ motion declaring the 2024 Arts and Health Week, the importance of collaborations in this growing cross sector area, and this year’s Arts and Health Week Summit. You can learn more about our commitment to arts as important for health, and our related work, in an overview we developed with the LA County Department of Public Health.
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