On March 26, 2019, the creative community will come together for Creativity Connects: MASSCreative Arts Advocacy Day to show our state political leaders that arts and creativity should be an expected, recognized, and valued part of everyday life.

Join us for a morning at Emerson Paramount Center in downtown Boston and an afternoon at the State House. After a morning of connecting with friends and colleagues, celebrating arts & culture, and sharpening our advocacy skills at the Paramount, we will march together to the State House. When we arrive, we will meet with our legislators about arts and cultural issues, including the state budget, arts education, and creative placemaking. Questions about accessibility? Click here.

Here’s the program for Arts Advocacy Day on March 26 in Boston. 

•   9:00: Registration, breakfast, socializing at Emerson Paramount Center, Boston
  
  
• 10:00-1:00: Program
  • Welcome
    • Spoken Word Performance: Alexis Maxwell, Boston Arts Academy student
    • Emcee: David Howse, Executive Director, ArtsEmerson
    • Lee Pelton, President, Emerson College
    • Matt Wilson, Executive Director, MASSCreative
    • Anita Walker, Executive Director, Mass Cultural Council
    • Senator Edward Kennedy (D-Lowell), Chair, Joint Committee on Tourism, Arts and Cultural Development
  • Performance: Central Square Theater's Youth Underground
    
    
  • How to be an effective arts advocate
    • MASSCreative Policy Platform with Emily Ruddock, MASSCreative Director of Policy and Government Affairs
      • Healthy and happy people
        • Carrie Eldridge-Dickson, Shelter Music Boston
      • Robust economy and supported creative workforce
        • Catherine Morris, BAMS Fest
      • Educated and well-rounded young people
        • Priscilla Kane Hellweg, Enchanted Circle Theater
      • Strong and vibrant communities
        • Tracy Silva Barbosa, artist, New Bedford
      • Access and participation to creativity for all
        • Rebecca Wright, Fitchburg Museum
  • Public Narrative: Stories to share at the State House
    • Maurice Emmanuel Parent, Actor and Executive Director of Front Porch Arts Collective
      • David Kuehn, Cotuit Center for the Arts, Cape Cod
      • Kati Nalbandian, Creative Collective, Salem
      • Caroline Noonan, Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts, North Adams
      • Hyppolite Ntigurirwa, artist, Rwanda
      • Audrey Seraphin, ArtsBoston, Boston
      • Lisa Simmons, Mass Cultural Council, Boston
      • Harold Steward, The Theater Offensive, Boston
      • Meg Winikates, New England Museum Association, Northampton
  • A legislative meeting in action with Representative Mary Keefe (D-Worcester), Co-Chair, Legislative Cultural Caucus
    • Erin Williams, Cultural Development Officer, City of Worcester
      
    • Che Anderson, City of Worcester
    • Lisa Drexhage, The Worcester Business Development Corporation
    • Yaffa Fain, City of Worcester
    • Hank Von Helion, Worcester PopUP
      
  • Senate District Huddles to plan for State House visits
    
    
  • Performance: Youth musicians from Summer Street Brass Band
• 1:00: Arts March from Emerson Paramount Center to the MA State House
  
  • Boston Area Brigade of Activist Musicians (BABAM!)
  • Keytar Bear
  • Summer Street Brass Band 
• 2:00-3:30: Meet with your Legislators/Legislative Staffers in the MA State House
  
  
• 3:30-4:00: Debrief in Hearing Room 437
  
  
• 4:00-6:00: After-party at Democracy Brewing, 35 Temple Place, Boston

To prepare for the day:

• Prepare for meeting with your legislators or their legislative staffers.
  • MASSCreative staff and arts leaders from across the state have been working hard to schedule meetings with your legislators tomorrow. We'll slot you into available group meetings with your legislators or their legislative staffers based on your registration information.
  • Check out our Policy Platform materials and tips. Take a look our 2019-20 Policy Platform and fact sheets about our statewide policy issues - state arts funding and creative placemaking. These are the issues we will be discussing with legislators and legislative staffers on Tuesday. 
  • Don't know much about your legislator? Read your Senator’s bio here and your Representative’s bio here.
  • Learn more about Mass Cultural Council grants awarded in your Senator's district here and your Representative's district here. 
• Plan your travel. Check out ArtsEmerson’s website for directions, parking, and accessibility.
• Plan to arrive by 9:30AM. Registration and breakfast begins at 9:00AM. There will be a crowd, so plan to arrive by 9:30 to get everything you need from registration. Program begins at 10:00AM.
• Food. Breakfast begins at 9:00AM. Snack packs will be provided. There's also a cafeteria in the State House. We encourage you to bring your own water bottle.
• Bring some swag. We’re so excited to showcase the creative community. Bring along materials that represent your creativity, your organization, as well as a banner and signs to carry during the 'Arts March'. Just make sure everything is small enough to fit back into a bag and safe to bring into the State House – nothing on sticks, please.
• Follow the action. Use #CreativityConnects to amplify the conversation on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. We want to make Arts Advocacy Day accessible to everyone, including folks who can't physically be there on March 26. Our friends at HowlRound will be livestreaming Arts Advocacy Day from the Emerson Paramount Center starting at 10AM.