Summary
Our mission is to establish a center where homeless children from the South Florida area will be taken each day and taught the various art forms. State of Florida Certified art teachers will be on board and will handle the bulk of the art education.
Our drive is simple; to provide art programs for homeless and other vulnerable children in an effort to foster their sense of joy, expand their creativity and and raise their self esteem. By t doing these things we also help the families of homeless children by promoting a sense of hope and stability.
Each kid’s art work will then be displayed at our local gallery. Their work will be sold in the gallery and the profits from each artwork will go towards the family of each child or deposited in a fund that will go towards their college education. We do not keep any proceeds from the sale of the art work created by these children.
What We Need
We have made contacts with several homeless shelters in our area and they have agreed to allow us to bring our services to their residents.
There are currently an estimated over 50,000 homeless children in Florida with the largest share going to Miami Dade and Broward counties.
"Homelessness among school-age children has soared from 30,878 in the 2006-07 school year to 56,680 in 2010-11. Homelessness for children of all ages, including those too young for public school, was 83,957 in 2010-11, up from 49,886 in 2006-07." http://stateimpact.npr.org/
Our main funding comes from State and Federal grants but they can take up to 90 days or longer to materialize.
However, office supplies, rent, utilities and equipment need to be obtained prior to the grant award.
By giving services to local public school children we may qualify for local school board funding as well.
The Impact
Research has shown that many, specifically the elderly and the young, can greatly benefit from exposure to arts. We aim to make these services available to as many in our community as possible.
Younger children receive art education as a form of expression. Older children also benefit from a vocational element (art into business, marketing) which is included in their art training.
They will also receive online writing training as part of their vocational training so they can explore careers as online platform writers for sites such as HubPages, Yahoo Voices and many more as well as learning how to produce, publish and market eBooks.
All participants will receive the services of dedicated case managers, certified art instructors, referral to other social services for them and their family,field trips to art related activities, college application and FAFSA completion assistance. The older youths will have the services of job placement specialists.
We are hoping to add the services to senior citizens as well and we have reached preliminary agreements with several agencies that cater to seniors.
Another key point is the planned expansion to offer in kind services to children with autism and our staff will receive training at a local college to better deal and understand the needs of the autistic child.
All participants get free transportation, free meals and supplies.
Another aspect that we want to include is placing the older kids in art related internships with local participating businesses.
Do programs such as this have an impact? A good question and you only need look at other similar projects especially in California where the DrawBridge program has been making an impact since 1991. http://www.drawbridge.org/about.html
Another very good project is Art Start; http://art-start.org/programs/homeless-youth-ou...
Challenges
Things can change. The grant authorities may close all applications and the grants may run dry. We aim to tackle these issues by continually partnering with private industries for funding as well as always welcoming donations.
Although it seems unlikely that Federal funds will stop for causes such as ours, States have been known to drastically reduce and even cut funding. In this case our grant writers will seek other alternatives but the main bulk will still be sought from the Federal Government and other local entities.
Other Ways You Can Help
If you cannot spare a few dollars to make an impact in the life of a homeless child, would you please share the project with all your social contacts and let friends and relatives know about us.
Contacting us
We will try to answer any question within 24 hours so please feel free to drop us a line at: artforkidsmiami11@yahoo.com