July 12, 2017
Message From Our President and CEO • Online Data Fluency Courses • Caralyn Spector Joins DataArts • Tips: Notifications • AFTA Releases AEP5 • Advocacy Tools Help Gain Lawmakers' Support • Guest Perspective: Overcoming My Fear of Upgrades • Featured Research • Case Study: Silk Road Rising • DataArts On the Road
Above: Coolidge Corner Theatre. Movie house., Brookline, MA. Image credit Eric Scott Photography
Above: President and CEO Beth Tuttle
A Message From DataArts' President and CEO
Dear friends and colleagues: Thank you for being a partner to DataArts. Your support and collaboration has been critical to DataArts’ transformation and success to date. My life has been enriched by getting to know you, and I am inspired by the work you do to make arts and culture a vital part of every person's life. I am writing today to let you know that I will end my tenure as President and CEO of DataArts effective October 6, 2017. When I joined DataArts in 2013, the organization was in the earliest days of start-up as an independent 501(c)(3). I initially committed to being here for three years and knew it would be a period of enormous change and opportunity as the talented DataArts staff and Board worked to chart a course towards the future. Now
I find myself coming up on five years at the helm, and I know that DataArts is in a wonderful position to move to the next phase of operations. With a strong and deeply committed staff and Board, sound financial foundation, new technology platform, and suite of educational resources in place, DataArts presents an exciting opportunity for a new leader. Read more.
Become a Data-Driven Decisionmaker with Free Online Courses We're bringing together an energized learning community committed to building greater data fluency. Over 600 arts and culture professionals have registered for DataArts' Data Essentials courses. Our free, online resources teach the basics of using data for decision-making, financial management, audience development, and arts advocacy. This fall, we’ll launch a new course on survey design. Interested in building your data skills?
Caralyn Spector Joins DataArts; New Board Leaders Elected
DataArts is expanding its leadership team with the addition of Caralyn Spector, former Senior Advisor to the Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), as Chief Operating Officer, effective August 1. DataArts' Board, which met June 22 and 23 in Philadelphia, elected Rich Mintz, Executive Vice President, Blue State Digital as its Chair. Outgoing Board Chair Glen Howard, who has served DataArts since 2012 through its move from a project of The Pew Charitable Trusts to an independent national nonprofit organization, was elected Founding Chair.
Read more.
Above: Caralyn Spector, DataArts' new COO
Tips and Tricks for DataArts Users:
Introducing User Notifications
Above: Screenshot showing report building progress
Sometimes small things make a big difference. DataArts’ tech team has been hard at work, coming up with ways to enhance the user experience, making the platform easier and more productive to use. Recently, we’ve added notifications – messages that let users know what’s happening behind the scenes or provide useful reminders at just the right time.
Read more.
Arts and Economic Prosperity 5 Released by AFTA, Powered by DataArts
Americans for the Arts (AFTA) has released Arts and Economic Prosperity 5, its fifth annual national study. AEP5 illuminates the economic power of the nonprofit arts sector, which generated $166.3 billion in spending in 2015. DataArts is proud to have supported AFTA's data collection efforts using a consolidated survey to save CDP participants effort and increasing the number of organizations now represented in the national DataArts dataset.
Read more.
DataArts' Advocacy Tools Help Gain Lawmakers' SupportArts leaders are searching for new ways to effectively communicate the value and impact of the arts to our public and elected official as new funding challenges loom, The Chronicle of Philanthropy put this challenge front and center with an article titled
“How Arts and Culture Groups Can Gain Lawmakers’ Support.” DataArts' CEO, Beth Tuttle, offered specific recommendations for arts and culture professionals: - Remind public officials that arts and arts groups are advancing public good, often working with underserved communities;
- Build data skills to be better able to share information with busy lawmakers;
- Pair data with stories for maximum impact.
More information on our advocacy tools, along with free downloadable state advocacy reports, are available at culturaldata.org.advocacy.
Above: Collaboration, Chicago, IL.Jessica Hudson in "Spider in the Attic”- Photo by: Saverio Truglia from SKETCHBOOK X
Guest Perspective:
Overcoming My Fear of Upgrades
Above: Collaboration, Chicago, IL.Jessica Hudson in "Spider in the Attic”- Photo by: Saverio Truglia from SKETCHBOOK X
by Zannie Girard Voss (left), Director, SMU National Center for Arts Research, Chair and Professor, Arts Management and Arts Entrepreneurship Meadows School of the Arts & Cox School of Business This has been a big year for DataArts and for all of us who work with its Cultural Data Profile (CDP) data. DataArts is a valued, primary data partner of Southern Methodist Univerity’s National Center for Arts Research (NCAR), and data from its CDP power NCAR’s Key Intangible Performance Indicators (KIPI) dashboard and inform our reports and white papers.
A key reason it was a big year was massive change, ultimately for the better. It centered on the conversion from an older, outdated survey that required all respondents to see and work through more than 1,250 possible responses, to a new, modular format with more internal checks and balances. Read more.
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National Guild for
Community Arts Education
Benchmarking Data Report This year, the National Guild commissioned DataArts to collect and report on data from over 150 of its member arts education organizations focusing on salaries, finances, instructional fees, enrollment demographics and more.
Read more.
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Creative Minnesota 2017
"If the (nonprofit arts and culture) sector were regarded as a single employer, it would be larger than Mayo Clinic, 22 percent larger than the state of Minnesota, and 77 percent larger than Target Corporation.” This and other insights are available from the 2017 Creative Minnesota study, made possible by the high level of participation by Minnesota’s arts and culture organizations in DataArts’ Cultural Data Profile. Read more.
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Case Study: Silk Road Rising
Above: Silk Road Rising, Chicago, IL. Minita Gandhi, Adam Poss, and Mark Smith in Rajiv Joseph's "The Lake Effect" (2013). Image credit: Michael Brosilow
Chicago-based theater company Silk Road Rising used DataArts' analytic reports to compare investments in online fundraising with peer organizations and persuade their board to support a new strategy. "DataArts positively impacts our decisionmaking," said founding Executive Director Malik Gillani. "Today I'm using CDP data to make the strongest case possible for funding and support." Read more.
DataArts on the Road
Upcoming: New User Orientation Workshop and Building Blocks of Financial Health
in San Francisco, CA in August. Looking ahead, Arin Sullivan, our VP and Director of Programs and Products, will be presenting at the 2017 GIA Conference
on The Movements that Matter: How Data-driven Strategies are Building Communities, with Randy Cohen of the Americans for the Arts and David Fraher, Executive Director, Arts Midwest, and organized and moderated by San San Wong, the Barr Foundations' Senior Program Officer. See calendar.
DataArts, 400 Market Street, Suite 600, Philadelphia,
PA 19106 215-383-0700 • info@culturaldata.org
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