![The Partners ,[object Object],[object Object],[object Object],[object Object]](data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7)
More Related Content
What's hot
What's hot (12)
Similar to Make The Case Presentation 10 22 09 Ppt 97
Similar to Make The Case Presentation 10 22 09 Ppt 97 (20)
Make The Case Presentation 10 22 09 Ppt 97
- 1. How Southeastern Michigan Values Arts & Culture
- 11. What We Learned
- 23. How People React to These Statements
- 24. Community Identity / Sense of Place Arts and culture create a sense of pride and place. Arts and culture make the unique character of a community visible, for all to see. Arts and culture create times for people and family members of all ages to gather together and share an experience. Arts and culture help us to display our heritage. And to discover other people’s heritage. Volunteerism in arts and culture increases community pride.
- 28. Economic Engine Arts and culture attract patrons, tourists, residents and their dollars. Arts and cultural organizations are often at the center of developing or revitalizing cities, villages and townships. (Think The Purple Rose Theater and Chelsea.) That’s because other businesses build up around performing arts centers, community theaters, arts centers and museums. Arts and cultural organizations employ people, spend dollars and generate local business activity. Non-profit arts organizations employ more than 6,000 in Southeastern Michigan. They have annual budgets totaling over $300 million, most of which is spent locally.
- 36. Quality of Life The arts teach us what it means to be fully human. The arts help us to create beauty. The arts help us to create something new. The arts help us to see the world as others see it. The arts help us to stretch beyond the everyday. In the age of the internet, arts and cultural activities are needed to bring people together for a real experience in a real time and place. As an audience, we get to share a positive feeling about the same thing at the same time. This builds bonds between people and within families. Arts and culture help us to understand the past. To experience the present. And to explore possibilities for the future.
- 43. Education The arts are essential for children to grow into well-rounded adults. The arts strengthen moral and spiritual growth. The arts help children to understand themselves and their world. Arts and culture are a balance to the shallowness of some of today’s pop culture. Participation in the arts teaches kids how to think creatively, an essential 21 st century work skill. Children involved in the arts are more successful in school. They learn to work well together in teams. They get more involved in their communities. Of course, the arts also provide lifelong leaning for adults too.
- 47. Building a Better Educated Workforce Arts and culture help to build a better educated workforce. Surveys show that there is a link between participating in arts and culture and overall success in school. That’s why businesspeople, looking for a 21 st century workforce, want to locate in communities with a rich cultural life: Google in Ann Arbor, Compuware in downtown Detroit, Motown Motion Picture Studios in Pontiac. Arts programs also make cultural diversity visible. This sends an important message that Southeastern Michigan welcomes people of all kinds to our region. Arts and culture help to attract and to retain the business and talent Southeastern Michigan needs.
- 50. Recommendations and Next Steps
- 54. Making the Case Implementation
- 59. Sign up for the Making the Case Task Force
Editor's Notes
- Partnership between the Cultural Alliance and ArtServe Michigan Supported by the MCACA Partnerships Program grant awarded to ArtServe Create a more positive public perception of arts, culture and arts in education within Southeast Michigan by building long term relationships with key constituencies. By listening to these groups, we will learn to speak in terms they value about the essential role of arts and culture for the welfare and future of the state, its regions, communities and citizens. Give CASM member organizations the information, messages and tools to present their work in ways that are proven to persuade key constituencies. This will help members to improve the perception of their own organizations, and will uplift perception of the arts and culture sector as a whole. Provide ASM with a model that can be replicated in other regions of Michigan, including both key messages and strategies and tactics to deliver them consistently. This information will be used for the ArtServe Community Arts Leadership Academy, and lays the groundwork for longer term, statewide advocacy work for the 2010 elections and/or to create a Michigan cultural trust fund in the future.
- Too often, we are preaching to the choir. The goal of this project was to talk to the people who are not our strongest supporters – but who do know our regional communities well.
- From a research perspective, this unaided, open-ended questions are key, because respondents express their top-of-mind thoughts, in their own words, about the value of arts and culture. In essence, the respondents are making a case for the arts that would persuade them.
- Mark Paris has worked as an Account Planner at major advertising agencies, such as Young & Rubicam and Campbell-Ewald. His job was to understand the rational and emotional needs of a client’s target audience. While researchers focus on quantitative, numerical results, Account Planners explore the full-blow humanity of the people that we are trying to persuade. Paris has done such research for clients including Yahoo, Chevrolet, DuPont, Dr. Pepper, and Hatteras Yachts, and in our region, the Metro Detroit Convention and Visitors Bureau, the RenCen, and The Henry Ford.
- Before the research subjects were given our case statements, we asked them what comes to mind when they think of arts and culture in our region. Top-of-Mind fell into two categories, one much larger than the other: People talk first about the major institutions – especially the DIA and DSO. They also mentioned The Henry Ford, and commercial arts presenters like the Fisher Theater. 70-90% of our research subjects responded this way.
- Then, about 30% of them also mentioned a local venue, such as an arts and crafts fair or street festival. In the qualitative research, businesspeople, local government officials and community leaders spent more time and spent more energy talking about things local – which may be due to their direct involvement or investment in establishing and nurturing local activities for their constituents. Parents strongly focused on the major institutions; while community leaders had a broader vision of the arts in their communities. What they don’t mention are organizations in the middle. The name recognition isn’t there.
- Then, about 30% of them also mentioned a local venue, such as an arts and crafts fair or street festival. In the qualitative research, businesspeople, local government officials and community leaders spent more time and spent more energy talking about things local – which may be due to their direct involvement or investment in establishing and nurturing local activities for their constituents. Parents strongly focused on the major institutions; while community leaders had a broader vision of the arts in their communities. What they don’t mention are organizations in the middle. The name recognition isn’t there.
- The good news is that the comments made by our subjects, without prompting, were overwhelmingly positive. Only ____ made statements that included negative comments, like “Not much.” “I’m not that into it.” “I could live without them.” Many simply expressed a positive: “Very important.” “I love it.” “HUGE.” The other interesting aspect was that, particularly in the one-on-one interviews, respondents described a personal relationship to arts and culture. An experience they had had, a particular passion they have for collecting art or a certain type of music, or that someone in their family was really into some aspect of the arts. These stories were personal .
- Examples of personal stories
- Three qualities emerged as top of mind for research subjects. These are qualities that arts and culture bring to people. The first, and by far the most frequent, was diversity. Diversity in its broadest sense: both having art and culture reflect your own ethnicity or point of view; but also the role art and culture plays in helping people to learn about other people’s art, culture or history. It’s about broadening your point of view.
- Then, when asked to rank the case statements against one another, this finding was further confirmed. However, the relative weight of the cases was different for different audiences. In this research, the responses of the businesspeople and the parents are closely aligned. They both ranked the cases in this order: Education first, Quality of Life second, Community Identity third, Economic Engine fourth. The community leaders and local government officials see things a little differently. This could be because the nature of their jobs compels deeper thinking about a broader range of issues than most of us. Their top two were Community Identity and Economic Engine, followed by Quality of Life. Education came in fourth.
- Respondents found the first four case statements to be generally convincing. Workforce Development they did not find convincing. However, in the other statements, while people agreed with the premise, we learned that there is a lot of room for improvement to make them truly compelling. Simon will review the statements and feedback for each one.
- The first statement is Community Identity and Sense of Place. This was ranked #1 by government officials and community leaders: but #3 in importance by businesspeople and parents.
- Sense of Place ranked # 1 with government and community leaders – because that is their mission. For local government officials and community leaders, this case is the sweet spot for presenting the value of arts and culture. It embraces their efforts to improve the places which they serve. It implies that arts and cultural organizations share their mission.
- Visible results of economic activity are critical. We can’t just talk to the community – it is powerful only when they see it for themselves.
- With the right support points, this case has the potential to be persuasive. Without those points, it could do harm.
- Local elected officials and community leaders find this case much more important and convincing. But they are focused on how the arts creates a vibrant area – something that gets more people to come, or gives character to the community. They are less interested in what happens inside the walls of an institution.
- We’ve already seen Quality of Life popping up in these comments earlier. And for Quality of Life what the research is showing is that data and general descriptions don’t work – STORIES do.
- Several interviewed, mentioned the distinctive power that the arts have in extracting and promoting the unique talents within each individual
- Note the reference to sports. Our audiences do not make a distinction between the role or sports and the arts in communities – they both get people together, create community pride and social bonding.
- We learned one lesson by accident. In the case statement, a reference to the internet was included, in this statement to make the point about the role of arts to bring people together. This turned out to be a major distraction – many people focused on this, and in focus groups people started to debate the internet – whether it isolates people or brings them together - throwing them off topic. We found that in making our case for the arts, we are better off sticking to traditional values, and avoiding more contemporary issues. (POLARIZING)
- An interesting finding was that many elected official said that while they appreciated the more aesoteric case for quality of life, they did not feel it would appeal to their constituents, the average Joe.
- Leaders thought the Education case was too expected.
- Which brings me to the statement that our respondents found the least convincing.
- This case may encounter a mixture of rational and emotional resistance. Rational: the identification of arts with a work skill. Emotional: the tone of expression may come off as too jaunty, glib or superficial for this topic and this audience. This best potential points in this case can be used in an economic argument. Developing that Economic case may be a better use of resources. More see the concept of a “smart workforce” or “knowledge workers” as not a good fit for the region today.
- This research is not intended to sit on a shelf. We want to use it to move to the next level. We know that changing public opinion is a long term effort, and that building awareness takes time. Here are our goals. Refer to the handout, which lists the next slides succinctly.
- Our strategy is to work from two directions.
- Taking the findings of this research and boiling it down, we have two key issues: First, what arts and culture does in the community and the region is not visible enough. It is not top-of-mind. Second, we do not have the evidence to support our case. Fine phrases and claims won’t do it. We need numbers, and specific examples. To make our case convincing, it must be supported in four ways: Quality of life must be in stories Learning to tell your story - need to know what topic to apply stories to. Not what you do, but why it matters.