January 25, 2022, Arts Every Day (AED) awards $15,000 to three Baltimore City Public Schools to implement large scale arts installations and collaborations that will have a long- term impact on their students and surrounding communities. This year’s projects include outdoor learning space with Curtis Bay Elementary Middle School in collaboration with artist Sue Stockman, a community mural with Lillie May Carroll Jackson Charter who is partnering with Art With a Heart, and Thomas Jefferson Elementary Middle’s outdoor learning space mosaic project together with teaching artist Amanda Pellerin.
Each project will host at least one community day or dedication ceremony that is open to the public where schools, artists, local partners and neighboring communities will come together to share the work and celebrate everyone involved. Community Days will take place before June of 2022.
Arts Every Day is proud to be a driving force in building and sustaining a Baltimore City public school system that embraces creativity, art, and culture as a fundamental requirement for a quality education. This grant program is an extension of this work, giving students, teachers, community members, and local artists the opportunity to come together to create impactful works, leave behind legacies, and strengthen relationships for all involved.
The Arts Every Day Public Art Grant for Baltimore City Public Schools is the only grant exclusively for Baltimore City Public Schools with the intention of supporting large scale, permanently installed projects that connect individual schools to local artists or organizations and their surrounding community. These projects serve as a source of pride and foster an appreciation for the arts and its influence on communities.
Since the start of the program in 2014, this initiative has grown to a competitive funding opportunity open to all Baltimore City Public Schools. Thanks to the generous support of the M&T Bank Charitable Foundation, the Creative Baltimore Fund, and the Maryland State Arts Council, the Public Art Grant for Baltimore City Schools will support three inspiring projects for the year 2022.
Public Art Grant for Baltimore City Public Schools Awardees for School Year 2022
Curtis Bay Elementary/ Middle: Seeding Circles: Building an Outdoor Classroom
Awarded $5,000
Curtis Bay EMS will work with artist Sue Stockman in small circles to learn basic techniques to promote self-regulation through mindfulness techniques including breathing, self-soothing postures, active listening, radical kindness, collaborative creating, and how to release negative emotions safely into the Earth. Vibrant designs will be created out of reclaimed materials to make seating for the existing raised bed garden, and modeling and practicing the new skills. “Check-ins” will allow each child to speak within the circle creating a “safe space” while others practice listening and taking turns. Students will learn about a growth mindset where making mistakes is part of learning, long-term goals and dreams can be achieved and will encourage each other, and practice compliments and kindness within our circle. The project will introduce the connection and reliance upon the earth and all the other inhabitants, plant native perennial plants provided by the Patuxent Research Center who will give a talk about native bees and pollinators.
Lillie May Carroll Jackson Charter School: A Call to Greatness
Awarded $5,000
Lillie May Carroll Jackson Charter School has prioritized celebrating the joy and beauty of
Black women and girls in a world that often stands against them. This project involves working with Art with Heart to create four panels, each highlighting an influential Black woman. Art with a Heart has over twenty years of experience in creating and installing community-based art projects. Each panel will be approximately 4’ x 10’. Photos will be printed on parachute cloth on which the participants will paint add fabric adornments related to the individual such as flowers or butterflies. The installation will include text with the name of the individual and a quote that speaks to their impact. The panels will be installed in our auditorium, the school’s largest space where full school and community events are held.
Thomas Jefferson Elementary Middle: We, The Mosaic Project
Awarded $5,000
Thomas Jefferson EMS will create a community mosaic that will revitalize the school grounds. Over the summer, wooden seating was installed outside on one side of the school. This art project will give life to this seating area so students and teachers can utilize it as a special outdoor learning space. A brick wall borders one edge of this space where they will be creating 3 rectangular mosaic panels that will be installed on the brick wall. Students will discuss the role of citizens in a community and define what makes us a strong community. One aspect of this learning will involve students creating a collection campaign, reaching out to local businesses to reclaim tiles and glass for our mosaic. Teaching Artist Amanda Pellerin will lead students through the art of mosaic making by helping students, families and community members engage with the materials and illustrate their ideas of community in our final mosaic panels.
About Arts Every Day
Arts Every Day strengthens learning by making arts education and cultural experiences an integral part of classroom instruction for all students in Baltimore City Public Schools. Serving as a catalyst for creative learning, Arts Every Day builds and sustains long-term partnerships with schools, artists, and cultural institutions while working to connect and empower teachers as leaders within their school communities.
A 501(c) 3 founded in 2006 as one in only eight organizations originally funded by the Ford Foundation, AED works to ensure all Baltimore City Public Schools students have access to the arts every day through arts education, arts programming, and arts-integrated instruction. Arts Every Day works toward this goal through the forging of partnerships with schools and the arts and cultural community over the long-term to inspire lasting change.
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