ArtsEd Washington Strategic Plan 2020-23

Our Mission

To support greater and equitable arts access for every student by transforming educational and legislative systems in Washington State.

Our Vision

We envision an educational system in Washington State schools where arts education is implemented and made accessible as part of the required curriculum for every student.

Our Organizational Values

  • Equity: in every aspect of our work, we are deeply committed to educational spaces of equitable and responsive access for all students across the state regardless of socioeconomic status, background, culture, identity, language or place of residence.
  • Advocacy: from the boardroom to the classroom, we authentically fight for each student in every school to receive arts education as part of their core education and cognitive, physical and social development.
  • Collaboration: we acknowledge the intricacy in navigating the political world of education and look to other committed organizations, policy decision makers, and community leaders to help drive our mission.

The Purpose of the Strategic Plan

  • The goals of the Plan should serve the best interests of all Washington State students, Arts educators, artists and arts organizations with a specific focus on the underserved areas;
  • The Plan should aim to redefine and prioritize current key resources, partners and fields of action, while exploring opportunities to develop and expand;
  • The process leading to the articulation of the Plan should include students, educators, residents, patrons, economic partners, artists and art organizations throughout the Washington State.

Strategic Priorities

To achieve our vision in alignment with our organizational values, the following strategic priorities will define our direction over the next three years. This focus will inform how we strengthen our organizational capacity and move each of these priorities forward. The four strategic priorities are:

  1. Equity: Increase equitable access to arts education for students throughout the state
  2. Advocacy: Grow organization’s capacity to advocate for equitable arts access
  3. Collaboration: Increase statewide collaborative opportunities and strategic partnerships
  4. Capacity Building: Strengthen organizational capacity to achieve programmatic strategic priorities

Increase equitable access to arts education • Improve awareness of eligibility and funding through outreach and partnership initiatives while improving access to programs; • Develop innovative program strategies to build community between parents, educators and legislators around students’ right for art education. Grow organization’s capacity to advocate • Build community engagement and inspire action through community education, artmaking and storytelling; • Build a stronger network of advocates and amplifiers, especially within historically underserved groups. Increase statewide collaboration • Support the development of arts plans on the local and state levels; • Strengthen partnerships with arts and advocacy organizations across the state and launch connector programs with partnership organizations Build community engagement and inspire action through community education, artmaking and storytelling. Strengthen organizational capacity to achieve programmatic strategic priorities • Communications - develop a comprehensive communications plan to increase visibility, engage and educate our community. • Financial Health – strengthen funding relationships with partners, steward financial resources effectively, and drive revenue. • Systems – implement systems to improve communication, inform decision making and continued improvement.

 

Implementation

We are developing an implementation plan to put the commitments of this Strategic Plan into action over the next three years, in collaboration with arts and cultural communities throughout the Washington State.

Next steps will include the following:

  • Addressing the limited access to Statewide Education data and arts funding shortfalls through the collaboration with OSPI and arts advocacy organizations;
  • Reviewing of all organizational policies and programs under each strategic direction;
  • Developing a plan to build awareness about the ALIC program and make it more accessible for schools throughout the state;
  • Developing a communications plan;
  • Developing new and enhanced programs and approaches that reflect the needs of the arts and culture sector.

 Tracking Success

We will be dynamic and accountable both in our vision and actions, recognizing that some steps will be determined as we go along. We will provide annual updates on our progress and goals, inviting feedback from community stakeholders.

We will also develop measurements for our performance to remain accountable to our strategic directions, and will report out on what we’ve achieved, what we’ve learned and where we still need to go.