HI Folks,

Here's a very short summary of the courses we proposed for a diploma in arts for social change, part of 60-page submission.

International Centre of Art for Social Change

Proposed Arts for Social Change Program

Course Summaries

COURSE 1

Exploring Arts for Social Change: Communities in Action

(EDUC 496) 13 weeks

Credit and non-credit

An overview of the field that includes: historical, local, global case studies; goals and strategies; overview of discipline-specific forms; forms and roles of dialogue processes; arts and social change writing by Canadian and international scholars; issues in the field, including ethics; invited practitioner-guests from the field; hands-on, collective arts-creation projects; reflective writing.

COURSE 2

Digital Literacies and Participatory Cultures

(CMNS 487) 13 weeks

Credit and non-credit

Examines the nature, meaning and pedagogical implications of participatory media cultures, including their relationship to the development of a digitally literate citizenry. Explores forms of activism including arts-based practices for social change, using digital media; community and web-based/mediated communications; issues of social justice, globalization, environment.

COURSE 3

Summer Institute: Arts for Social Change Workshops

4 weeks

Credit and non-credit

A series of arts-discipline workshops with community artists and faculty that provides hands-on community arts experiences as well as instruction in pedagogical approaches of frequently-used local arts for social change practices. Disciplines may include specific forms of dance, music, theatre, visual and digital arts.

COURSE 4

Reaching Across the Silos: Partnerships and Community Collaborations

13 weeks

Non-credit

This course covers the following topic areas: working with diverse communities (arts institutions/individual artists, cultural communities, professional sectors, community centres, youth, elders, in health, justice systems, with researchers); building projects: collaborations and partnerships; issues of sustainability and skills transfer; case studies; dialogue & facilitation workshops; conflict resolution/building consensus; student project creation (concepts only).

COURSE 5

The Business of Social Innovation and the Arts

13 weeks

Credit and non-credit

An overview of social innovation perspectives and strategies, including local and international case studies; arts practices in community development; social entrepreneurship; project concept development as well as workshops in project design and management; roles of boards and advisory committees; human resources (incl. staffing and volunteers); funding and communications strategies.

COURSE 6

(EDUC) Special Topics: Project Documentation, Evaluation & Research

13 weeks

Credit and non-credit

This course introduces students to strategies designed to enable practitioners to document, evaluate and report on program delivery and outcomes in the field of arts for social change. Concurrently, students will be assigned to a community organization and/or artist working in the field.

INQUIRY-BASED Internship with arts for social change organization

8 weeks

Following a two-week orientation, students will be assigned to a five-week placement with a community organization that will involve applying the research, documentation, evaluation, and reporting strategies explored in the course. A final week back in the classroom for reflection and reports will conclude the internship.

And here's a description of the Chataqua Project!

The Chataqua Project

Summary Description

A year-long series of hands-on arts workshops, dialogues and other events in Vancouver designed to connect and build new relationships and mutual understandings between artists working in community-engaged arts practices and those working in other fields, including health, business (especially social entrepreneurship); the justice system, those working on inter-cultural and inter-generational issues, in education and environmental/social justice agendas.

· Provides artists with learning, exchange and networking opportunities that will enable them to better understand the languages, methods and challenges of work in other community-engaged sectors. In turn, those who may not know much about the field of arts-in-community work will have opportunities to experience hands-on work with local artists and explore/initiate collaboration with arts professionals in the field.

· The Chataqua Project is a direct response to challenges of resources and isolation in the field of arts for social change/creative community development/community-engaged arts. There is growing attention in other sectors to the necessity of creativity, innovation and inclusion in agendas for positive change…and a hunger for approaches that embrace the whole human, while also addressing the need for structural change. The project attempts to open doors for increased exchange and collaboration across disciplines by providing opportunities for dialogue and experience.

Background

The Chataqua project is designed to address some of the barriers faced by artists working in the field of arts-in-community/arts for social change/community cultural development. These challenges include:

• the relative isolation of the field of community arts from other sectors and within the sector, itself
• a lack of access to capacity-building resources within the field and for professionals working in other sectors
• the existence of professional silos, creating a disconnect between artists and other innovators and changemakers working in a variety of community-engaged sectors
• prejudice within some segments of the arts community, itself, about the instrumental use of arts as a vehicle for social change
• the limited opportunities for knowledge-exchange between the private sector including CSR (corporate social responsibility) businesses, social entrepreneurs, foundations, individuals, and socially-engaged artists that would facilitate the learning of each others’ languages and perspectives, and potentially lead to fruitful, informed and sustainable collaboration

Whether the content for social change occurs in the work of an individual artist or evolves within collective processes, the arts offer a unique lens through which to see the world, often connecting the head and the heart. The arts, fully capable of providing an effective forum for the exploration and dissemination of endless perspectives, are too rarely part of new and more-inclusive strategies for social change, such as the emergent world of social innovation. The legitimacy and efficacy of arts-based processes are typically not recognized by change agents in both the private and public sectors who lack direct experience of the field’s approaches.

In 2009, a one-day gathering, of networking and discussion for local community-engaged artists and interested others from both the private and public sectors was attended by 250 people. This event, organized by JMP, clearly demonstrated a need for more interaction within the BC arts community and with other sectors, providing part of the impetus for imagining the Chataqua Project.

Project Structure

The Chataqua Project will take place in Vancouver from April 2012 to March, 2013. A preliminary series of research workshops and dialogues with invited participants will bring together change leaders in BC from several sectors to work with artist/facilitators. On-line materials will support and report on these gatherings, including a blog that will enable these conversations to continue. This process will be followed by three weekend public gatherings that will contain presentations, experiential learning and exchange in hands-on arts workshops, facilitated dialogues and small scale performances.

In the research process, JMP will identify and consult with key Vancouver/Lower Mainland arts and other social innovators. We will map assets and, through processes facilitated by artists and other forms of dialogue, identify and explore a focused and limited number of central challenges for participants – issues that seem most prescient in their sectors. We anticipate that this process will also widen the circle of engagement of the project. Reports of these consultations will be posted on our website, as well as short statements and questions from participants in this first round. An on-line blog will invite additional perspectives and comments. This process will set the stage for the public events and advance the dialogues before everyone works together.

The three Chataqua weekends (scheduled from Friday evening to Sunday afternoon) will be open to the public. There will be a choice of events to attend throughout the weekends, culminating in public dialogues on Sundays. Events will include presentations, arts workshops, facilitated dialogue and enough open time to allow for unstructured interaction. The exact shape and content of these events will evolve out of the preliminary exchanges processes. The intention of these public gatherings is to nurture knowledge exchange, further development of ideas generated in the preliminary processes, the establishment of cross-sector relationships and the creation of new collaborations. These weekends will be marketed through the networks that have been established in earlier phases of the project and through the networks of our organizational partners.

Arts-based processes will be the central elements for exploration and dialogue throughout the preliminary research and dialogue process and of the public events. Artists will take central roles, working alongside other participants and presenters who are creating significant social change in a wide range of communities in Canada and abroad. Using criteria of inclusion and diversity, we have already identified and contacted many individuals who are interested to take part in the Chataquas.

We will support travel for a limited number of artists from outside the Lower Mainland.

A video record of the three weekend events will be created, highlighting useful moments of experience and insight, as well as short interviews, for use in exchange and learning contexts. The video will be posted on our website, as will a text-based report that will also include materials from the preliminary on-line postings.

Participants

Two years of research preceded JMP’s International EARTH Symposium. This process paid off; more than six years later, many relationships are still active within that group of 300 participants. It is critical for the success of the Chataqua process that more research takes place to identify a wide range of participants from diverse communities who express not only interest in but also have the capacity to move forward on possible collaborative processes.

These include:

• Artists who will teach and present as well as participate in workshops and dialogues
• Artists who are already working in partnership with other organizations, as well as those who wish to widen their contacts outside the arts and better understand the perspectives and language of other forms of community-based social change/ community development.
• Members of the local business community, including those who are part of the growing sector of social entrepreneurs. JMP has presented at related conferences and special events over the last decade.
• Scholars, students, researchers and practitioners working in a variety of disciplines that include community development, education, health promotion and training, business training and social innovation, environment and sustainability, lawyers and others involved in human rights work, restorative justice, labour rights and new forms of conflict resolution

• Government officials and policy-makers who have worked with or who currently work with artists or who have expressed interest in advocating for arts integration into their policies and programs
• Officials from foundations and individual donors whose perspectives mesh with the goals of the project
• Strategic planners, consultants and fundraisers working with both for-profit and not-for-profit organizations

The number and range of artists/facilitators will depend on available resources. Artists who have confirmed their participation include:

David Diamond, AD, Headlines Theatre

Terry Hunter and Savannah Walling, Vancouver Moving Theatre and Heart of the City Festival

Elaine Carol, AD, Miscellaneous Productions

Will Weigler, theatre practitioner/researcher

Rena Sharon, AD, Vancouver International Song Institute

Lynn Fels, professor, arts education, Simon Fraser University

A preliminary list of 65 participants from the arts and a variety of other sectors who have expressed interest in participating can be provided. We anticipate that the initial research process will identify potential participants from a wide and diverse range of communities.

Social media, our partners’ networks, their communications assistance and mainstream media will be used to attract participants for the public events for which there will be a sliding scale of charges of admission.

Organization Partners

*The Vancouver Arts Alliance

*The Vancouver Community Arts Council

*The BC Civil Liberties Association

*Vancouver International Song Institute

*The Arts and Health Network

*The Social Venture Institute/Hollyhock

*The Carnegie Centre

*The Vancouver Dance Centre

***The Vancouver Board of Trade

**The Burnaby and Surrey Boards of Trade

***PIVOT Legal Society

***Vancouver Coastal Health

***West Coast LEAF (women’s legal aid)

***The Vancouver Parks Board

***MOSAIC (immigrant support services)

*Letter attached

**Letters confirmed but pending

***In discussion

Personnel

Project Director: Planning and oversight of the research process and of all invited and public Chataqua activities. Responsible for the further development of partnership arrangements, research, programming, scheduling. Oversees budget creation and control, reports and documentation.

Communications/social media/website manager: All on-line activities, including social media and website posting, blog management and posting of reports, work on marketing materials, some scheduling and logistical work

Event Manager/Volunteer Coordinator: All event logistics, including volunteer co-ordination; travel and accommodation arrangements for visiting artists

Researcher: Assists Project Director and Communications Manager in identifying relevant research resources

Technical director: Responsible for all technical aspects of Chataqua events