What Constitutes a New Nonprofit? Investigating Nonprofit Organizational Founding Dates

The question of when a new nonprofit is founded has not been pursued with sufficient precision. Specifically, a fundamental challenge facing any nonprofit researcher planning to detect, isolate, and analyze new nonprofits is that nonprofit founding is a process, not a discrete event. This study uses administrative data that includes three different founding indicators from more than 4,000 arts organizations, supplemented with survey data from 242 organizations, to illustrate some of the problems inherent in treating the founding process as one discrete event. It also elevates the voices of founders to demonstrate their conceptualization of the concept and offer insights into the multidimensionality of founding.

Arts Learning Across a City: How Ecosystem Thinking Helps Shape Understanding of Black-Centered and Eurocentric Arts Programming

Given historical patterns of unequal access to arts education, we used an ecosystem perspective to investigate Black Centered Arts and Eurocentric Arts in a mid-sized U.S. city, with a focus on youth programs, museums, and other youth arts organizations. We found that practitioner-leaders valued arts quality, equitable access, community embeddedness, and cultural preservation. Programs that provided access to Eurocentric arts tended to be older, larger, and better funded, and network analysis revealed a subnetwork made up largely of Black Centered Arts organizations. Results will inform an ongoing research-practice-philanthropy partnership structured to develop a more equitable city-wide arts ecosystem.

Rethinking creative research methods in response to COVID-19: Creating a remote research kit

The ‘Sensing Spaces of Healthcare: Rethinking the NHS Hospital’ project involves working with National Health Service (NHS) staff, patients and visitors to explore their experiences of hospital environments. Over the course of the project, creative approaches centred on art-based and design-led practices are employed to research people’s experiences. Such approaches often involve working closely with participants during sessions. As COVID-19 infection control measures have affected in-person research, it has been necessary to develop and adopt alternative low-contact approaches. This article presents the development of a remote creative research kit designed to be used without a researcher/practitioner present. The kit has been developed through work with creative practitioners, hospital arts organizations, patient and public contributors and learning from public engagement events. The remote creative research kit has led to rethinking and reimagining the ways in which such approaches may be of benefit more broadly in healthcare settings.

Willingness to Volunteer: An Exploration of the Potential Volunteer Pool for Community Arts Programs

Volunteers are critical for many local arts and culture programs. In contrast to most research, we focus on potential rather than actual volunteers. Using data collected from an online survey of 948 participants, we explore the extent to which individuals are willing to contribute both their time and money to support community arts initiatives. Results from a binary two-stage instrumental variable (IV) probit indicate that a significant predictor of willingness to volunteer is the willingness to pay and the intangible value placed on arts activities and engagement. These findings have implications for recruitment initiatives by public and community arts organizations reliant on volunteer support.

Single Carrot Theatre: Financial Crisis Leads to Artistic Pivot

This teaching case study examines how Single Carrot Theatre in Baltimore, Maryland used adaptive capacity, leadership structures and risk assessment to implement a large organizational and artistic pivot. The case study is designed for undergraduate students to analyze how an established arts organization in financial risk can pivot from a traditional model to an innovative business structure while managing financial sustainability, audience growth and artistic vision. The Instructor’s Manual includes learning objectives, sample questions and additional resources to guide discussion around organizational culture and the important role of artistic vision in arts organizations.

Instructor's Manual: Single Carrot Theatre

Many arts organizations struggle to find long-term financial sustainability.[1] There are limited opportunities to build sustainable infrastructure and sources of long-term funding as organizations grow.[2] These risks are particularly challenging for organizations beyond the early startup phase that garner excitement and novelty. Single Carrot Theatre followed a traditional path of establishing a central theatre space for their operations, but unfortunately it created financial strain on the organization that almost resulted in permanent closure. With an established culture of innovation and a focus on artistic decision making, the company decided to implement an innovative organizational and artistic pivot. The company has successfully refined their mission to focus on site-specific and community-based theatre making. Although there were problems with public relations and limiting the perceived image of failure, the company was able to successfully retain a large portion of their patrons. Their nomadic structure lessened financial burdens, created an opportunity for new partners and funding sources and reestablished the company's unique brand of innovative theatre making. Early evidence suggests a recommitment of key stakeholders and potential for growing audiences in new ways. This case is designed to highlight how innovative arts entrepreneurs can pivot from traditional models of theatre and innovate financial success while remaining relevant and impactful to their audience. [1] “The Fundraising Report,” SMU DataArts, accessed January, 14, 2021, https://culturaldata.org/the-fundraising-report/the-fundraising-report-home/. [2] Ibid.