Seward Johnson, “A Reason to Smile,” installed at Grounds For Sculpture, Hamilton, NJ. (Photo by Flickr user Wally Gobetz)

On November 13, gunmen opened fire on approximately 1,500 unsuspecting audience members at an Eagles of Death Metal concert at Paris’s historic Le Bataclan music hall, killing 89. The Bataclan was the deadliest site in a cluster of coordinated terrorist attacks throughout the city that evening for which ISIS claimed responsibility. While U2 frontman Bono described the Bataclan massacre as “the first direct hit on music in this so-called war on terror,” the scale and locations of these attacks only solidified an unsettling new direction in terrorism: concert halls, stadiums, cafes, museums, and other cultural institutions (not just local or politically symbolic international sites) have all been targets this year. Indeed, ISIS’s statement of responsibility indicated that the attack sites were carefully chosen as symbols of “abominations and perversion.”

Leaders have responded by bolstering both physical and financial security for cultural venues. In addition to new safety measures, French cultural minister Fleur Pellerin established a “solidarity fund” of approximately $6 million to protect music groups from “expected declines in business and other financial hardships.” President François Hollande revealed a proposal for France’s museums to temporarily house Syrian cultural objects “at risk” of ISIS looting. Italy’s Prime Minister Matteo Renzi has pledged 1 billion euros to spend equally on culture and security, which has raised concerns among Italy’s business leaders that a corporate tax cut could be postponed as a result. How to protect concert halls and stadiums, and who will ultimately pay, have likewise come up in New York City: Ray Waddell, a senior editor at Billboard, suggested that more metal detectors and bag checks may mean higher ticket prices.

While questions remain about how best to allocate resources, protecting culture now seems especially urgent in “fighting back against a group that is notorious for destroying cultural symbols and objects it deems idolatrous.”

STEM education just got a little STEAMier: In what arts education advocates considered a “huge win,” the joint House-Senate Conference Committee unanimously accepted a bipartisan amendment to the rewrite of the nation’s Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) (aka “No Child Left Behind”) that will integrate the arts into STEM education. Introduced by Congresswoman Suzanne Bonamici (D-OR), the amendment sets the stage for new K-12 education policy by acknowledging that arts integration can “improve attainment of STEM-related skills” (science, technology, engineering and math). Last week, the House of Representatives overwhelmingly approved the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) that reauthorizes ESEA and includes additional language about the importance of the arts to a “well-rounded education.” ESSA’s more flexible math/reading test requirements and emphasis on state-level decision-making may also be friendly to arts education strategies, according to a detailed analysis by the National Art Education Association. This victory for arts ed advocates comes just after the Arts Education Partnership launched a five-year Action Agenda for Advancing the Arts in Education. It similarly emphasizes the importance of arts integration especially in underperforming and impoverished schools, and recommends incorporating the arts into training for teachers and academic leaders.

A new day in Canada: In a November letter to Minister of Culture Melanie Joly, new Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau demonstrated his intentions to make good on campaign promises to double the Canada Arts Council budget, provide $150M to CBC/Radio Canada, reinvest in Telefilm Canada and the National Film Board, and provide increased support for indigenous culture and youth initiatives. This is welcome news to arts groups after nine years of arts funding cuts under former conservative PM Stephen Harper. According to the Globe and Mail, Joly’s youth and relative inexperience in government will hopefully be an asset rather than liability in achieving this ambitious agenda while also redefining the ministry with “symbols of progressiveness.” Trudeau also gained popularity with social scientists when he announced in early November the reinstatement of a mandatory national census, which serves as the bedrock of all government data collection.

Ford Foundation’s new inequality-focused agenda will include the arts: In June we reported on Ford’s announcement that the foundation will shift its entire focus to fighting inequality. Three months later, president Darren Walker has revealed more detail on the specifics of the new strategy, which will involve consolidating 35 program areas into 15. While detailed arts funding guidelines have yet to be announced, Ford’s website lists a reframed creativity and free expression program encompassing “social justice storytelling” and “21st century arts infrastructure.” Walker’s “New Gospel of Wealth” essay suggests that the foundation’s ultimate goal is a reformed capitalist system, and creative expression is considered a piece of the puzzle. Ford will privilege initiatives for broader structural change over those providing direct assistance to the poor; discontinued programs include direct cash transfers in Latin America and microfinance, as well as causes like LGBT rights that have gained philanthropic support from other sources in recent years.While Ford’s program to construct new art spaces will also be cut, the foundation will increase its general operating support–with a new BUILD initiative to specifically strengthen the operations of social justice-oriented institutions and partnerships.

Cleveland arts organizations light up on election day as cigarette tax for the arts is renewed: An overwhelming majority of voters passed Issue 8, which will renew Cuyahoga County’s 10-year, 30-cent-a-pack tax on cigarettes to support arts and culture. The original approval of this tax in 2006 turned a region with scant arts funding into “one of the most highly ranked metro areas in the country in local public support for the arts.” More than 300 large and small arts organizations have depended on the $125 million in cigarette tax proceeds distributed since 2008 for both general operating support and special projects. The campaign to renew the levy was propelled by an Arts and Culture Action Committee that raised over $1 million for advertising, but the renewal faced very little visible opposition.

MUSICAL CHAIRS/COOL JOBS

• Prince Charitable Trusts welcomes Carolynn Brunette, who will head its Washington, D.C. office as Managing Director and also co-direct the Rhode Island program, beginning on January 1. Carolyn succeeds retiring Managing Director Kristin Pauly, who has been with Prince Charitable Trusts since 1998.
• New Orleans Arts Council CEO Kim Cook announced her departure at the end of 2015; Acting Director Nick Stillman will oversee the organization in the interim. Cook is moving to the Bay Area to serve as Burning Man’s Director of Art & Civic Engagement, a newly created position.
• Longtime theater critic Steven Leigh Morris will assume the role of LA Stage Alliance’s new executive director.
• UC Davis Law professor and international human rights scholar Karima Bennoune has been appointed special rapporteur on cultural rights to the United Nations Human Rights Council.
• The nonprofit sector mourned the sudden November 17 death of Rick Cohen, nonprofit advocate and national correspondent for Nonprofit Quarterly. Cohen previously led the led the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy, a foundation watchdog, and was known for focusing on the needs of low-income and underrepresented populations.
• CERF+, a national nonprofit that “provides a safety net to artists through readiness, education and relief programs,” seeks a Director of Programs. Deadline 12/18.
• The Newark Arts Council seeks a new Executive Director. Deadline January 1.

NEW RESEARCH OF NOTE

• The new book Making Culture Count: The Politics of Cultural Measurement, part of Australia-based publisher Palgrave Macmillan’s New Directions in Cultural Policy series, explores diverse approaches to cultural measurement and their political implications.
• Nesta, a UK-based foundation, presents a potentially fresh approach for measuring the intrinsic benefits of the arts–including asking people how much they would need to be paid to compensate for the removal of cultural institutions.
• An initial report on spillover effects of public investment in arts and culture in Europe reviews existing evidence and recommends a future “holistic research agenda” for the European Union.
• In the United States, the Nonprofit Finance Fund published an arts-specific analysis of its annual State of the Sector Survey, encompassing data from over 900 arts, culture and humanities organizations. Trends include decreased debt (but ongoing challenges with sustainability), and an emphasis on expanded programming and audience-building, as well as more focus on outcomes measurement.
• The Greater Philadelphia Cultural Alliance’s new assessment of the nonprofit arts sector spanning 11 U.S. metropolitan areas (using Cultural Data Project data) found that increased earned income is driving many organizations’ recession recovery, but they also face decreased contributed income among other fiscal challenges.
• A Theater Communications Group study indicates that U.S. nonprofit theaters still face shrinking attendance despite increased revenue; offering more family-friendly programming may help. Early exposure to theater could benefit young people in various ways; the Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders published findings from a randomized control trial that suggest theater training may boost skills in kids with autism.
• A new study by the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia offers a closer look at the pros and cons of gentrification in the City of Brotherly Love, with implications for national urban policy.
• The arts management workforce still does not match the diversity of the general population. Meanwhile, a survey of UK arts professionals suggests a “stark gender pay gap.”
• A Los Angeles County Arts Commission report analyzes the importance of volunteers to arts organizations – and of volunteer management.
• With Adele’s new album enjoying record-breaking sales last month despite not being available for streaming, researchers continue to debate the impact of digital music distribution. The NEA responded to a methodological debate that broke out earlier this year between the New York Times Magazine and The Future of Music Coalition by looking at what two alternative datasets might tell us about the viability of making a living as an artist in the digital age. Meanwhile, an analysis of two years of Spotify data from the Bureau of Economic Research suggests that music streaming “brings virtually no financial gain to the industry, but it also prevents losses.”
• Several reports explored the “dark side of creativity,” with growing evidence that creative people may be more dishonest and prone to depression and an exaggerated sense of entitlement.
• Finally, will there be more to be thankful for than usual this year? A Charities Aid Foundation study found that charitable giving is up around the world, including an increase from young people and men.

• A consortium of City of Detroit creditors have made the first legal move towards pressuring the Detroit Institute of Arts to sell city-owned artworks to help pay for debts owed. Executive Vice President Annemarie Erickson defends the museum against Emergency Manager Kevyn Orr’s demand that the museum find one way or another to contribute $500 million in assistance to the bankrupt city.
• The California Arts Council will apply a $2-million funding windfall it received from Assembly member John Perez to several new initiatives in arts education and community improvement, including Creative California Communities, The Arts in Turnaround Schools, and Jump stARTS. In the face of a 7.6% budget cut handed down last year, the state arts council is taking a gamble on the success of these programs winning fresh credibility with policymakers and an increase in annual funding.

MUSICAL CHAIRS

• Jamie Bennett, chief of staff and director of public affairs at the NEA, will take over as executive director of the creative placemaking funder collaboration ArtPlace America starting in January. He succeeds ArtPlace’s founding director Carol Coletta, who joined the Knight Foundation back in March, and interim head Jeremy Nowak.
• After a decade serving Californians as president of the James Irvine Foundation, James E. Canales will step down in the spring to become the first president of another arts funder, Boston’s Barr Foundation.

• There has been some shuffling in the world of state and local arts councils. Ohio Arts Council ED Julie Henahan has retired after thirty years; Milton Rhodes, President of the Arts Council of Winston-Salem and Forsyth County in North Carolina, has retired and been succeeded by Jim Sparrow; and Glenda Toups was dismissed from her position as ED of the Houma Regional Arts Council in Louisiana in the wake of the discovery by the board that the Council was not in compliance with state reporting law.

• We’ve known for a while that Michael Kaiser is leaving his post as President of the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts; now it turns out he’s taking the DeVos Institute of Arts Management with him. Both are moving to the University of Maryland, where Kaiser will be a professor of practice beginning in the fall, and hopes to expand the Institute to include a master’s program.
• Financial news giant Bloomberg has decided to discontinue its cultural journalism brand, Muse, in favor of focusing more on leisure and luxury. Along with the reassignment of Muse editor Manuela Hoelterhoff and a cadre of employees and contracted writers, the news outlet laid off theater critic Jeremy Gerard.

ALL ABOUT THE BENJAMINS

• The Hewlett Foundation has announced a rigorous new “Openness and Transparency” policy, which assumes from the outset that information the foundation creates should be made public to improve outcomes, spark debate, and foster collaboration. Hewlett’s President Larry Kramer offers context in a post on the foundation’s new blog; transparency watchdogs celebrate the policy.
• The D5 Coalition has released a scan of best practices and a guide to online resources for foundations wishing to advance diversity, equity, and inclusion at every stage of their work.

IN THE FIELD

• Eric Booth and Tricia Tunstall share profiles of El Sistema “encounters” in five of approximately 55 countries – Sweden, Austria, Korea, Japan, and Canada – that have borrowed from Venezuela’s seminal movement to realize youth development goals through “intensive investment in ensemble music.” The global umbrella for El Sistema has also released the first literature review of “research, evaluation, and critical debates” related to Sistema-inspired programs around the world.
• The Arts Council of Lawrence, New Jersey has shut down after 42 years, having, in the words of one member, “outlived [its] usefulness.” Originally formed by a group of female volunteers, the Council struggled to recruit younger members throughout the recession.
• The August Wilson Center for African American Culture in Pittsburgh is struggling mightily. After a struggle to find an audience and keep backers the organization has been forced to move further and further from its original intention to create a cultural home for the people portrayed in Wilson’s plays, working class African Americans. A conservator has been appointed to try to avoid liquidation.
• The Warehouse, an all-ages music venue in La Crosse, Wisconsin, has filed to become a nonprofit after 22 years as a for-profit, prompting some musicians to wax lyrical about their time there. Financial pressures were the primary impetus, but owner Steve Harm has indicated he will open the space to the local community in new ways to provide a public good.
• Fractured Atlas has added another tool to their encouraging-and-rewarding-arts-entrepreneurship tool belt. The Arts Entrepreneurs Awards will recognize artists and arts organizations who have “innovated new business practices or paradigms” or  “developed novel solutions to old problems.” Nominations will be accepted until December 22nd at 5:59pm.

BIG IDEAS

• A report from the Next Generation Evaluation Conference forecasts “game-changing” trends in impact evaluation, including shorter evaluation cycles and simpler measurement systems.
• “Is social practice gentrifying community arts out?” Arlene Goldbard parses the difference between the art world’s latest obsession and community cultural engagement.

RESEARCH CORNER

• Southern Methodist University’s National Center for Arts Research is about to release its inaugural report, drawing on what it calls the “most comprehensive set of data ever compiled” on arts organizations.  In addition to a statistical overview of the field – did you know that performance of an arts organization is lower in communities with a higher concentration of graduate degrees? – the report attempts to answer the question, “What makes one arts organization more successful than another?” The key turns out to be leadership.
• Speaking of data aggregation, Markets for Good has a progress report on the BRIDGE (Basic Registry of Identified Global Entities) project, an ambitious collaborative effort to identify and map philanthropic entities across the world.
• A new report by the Consumer Federation of America bashes “abuse of market power by a highly concentrated music sector,” argues against the need “to expand copyright holders’ rights,” and suggests that digital file-sharing (aka “piracy”) may, in some cases, actually be good for both artists and consumers. One well-circulated chart suggests that it is the proceeds of live performance, not recordings, that drives artists’ income.
• Gold standard at Crystal Bridges? In a rare, randomized, controlled (albeit “natural”) experiment on the effects of art on students, a single school-group visit to the major new museum appears to have raised students’ scores on vague but desirable traits such as critical thinking, social tolerance, historical empathy, and likelihood of future museum visits. It’s too soon to parse out the effect of contemporary art in particular.
• A study of STEM graduates from the Michigan State University’s Honors College found that graduates who went on to earn patents or start companies had more arts and crafts experiences than the average Americans – and believed their ability to innovate was influenced by that experience. (The paper itself is behind a paywall.)
• How “rampant” is gentrification? New research suggests that most urban areas experienced only “moderate” gentrification in the past decade, with significant variations across cities. Unsurprisingly, gentrification was most prevalent in large and dense metro regions with solid public transit infrastructure.