Frances Phillips reviews research about an arts education program the Walter & Elise Haas Foundation participated in over the past year responding to the idea of Emily Garvie from the Clarence E. Heller Charitable Foundation “of organizing arts nonprofits to lead subsidized pods for students who lacked access to consistent arts learning and schoolwork support.”
Phillips states:
Ultimately, arts organizations and youth development agencies joined to launch and sustain arts pods at ten sites in San Francisco, from September 2020 through the summer of 2021. By the end, the Walter & Elise Haas Fund had awarded $954,600 to support of this work — money specially allocated from the foundation’s endowment so as not to reduce regular program budgets. To evaluate the project’s success, we commissioned Social Policy Research Associates (SPR) to look at enrollment data, survey students and parents, facilitate focus group conversations, and prepare case studies.