a2ru

01/28/2025

Moving forward, a2ru will be focusing our social media posts on LinkedIn--please find us there!

a2ru | 915 followers on LinkedIn. Creating community & culture change for the arts in higher education. | a2ru a partnership of nearly 40 institutions committed to transforming research universities in order to ensure the greatest possible institutional support for interdisciplinary research, cu...

12/19/2024

Please join us at the University of Maryland January 22-23 for "Teaching the Arts in the Age of AI," hosted by UMD Arts for All. This gathering, which will feature a keynote by filmmaker Matthew Niederhauser, panels, demonstrations, and opportunities for exchange, has been designed to support faculty as educators and scholars as they integrate AI into their courses, artistic practices, and research efforts. Registration is open through January 15, and is open to all interested higher education professionals. Learn more and register: https://arts.umd.edu/teaching-arts-in-the-age-of-ai-symposium

12/02/2024

Thursday: join an informational webinar and Q&A at noon Eastern for the 2025 Renée Fleming Neuroarts Investigator Awards, administered by International Arts + Mind Lab & NeuroArts Blueprint.

The Renée Fleming Neuroarts Investigator Awards program, now in its second year and an integral part of the NeuroArts Blueprint Initiative, supports innovative and collaborative neuroarts-related research designed and conducted by early career researchers and artists.

Each Award will be jointly presented to (1) an early-career researcher who is affiliated with an academic institution and engaged in a field of basic science related to neuroarts; and (2) an arts practitioner working in an arts-based neuroarts discipline. Up to $25,000 in funding will be made available for each Award.

Register here:https://aspeninstitute.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_zOv1Y-_kR262m7RudWd1Zg?mc_cid=cd53c3127c&mc_eid=03cd7afe54 #/registration

11/22/2024

We are hiring!

Are you our next Financial & Membership Coordinator? This vital member of our team will support organizational operations & our growing network of member institutions. The role is based at a2ru's host institution, the University of Michigan . Learn more & apply: https://a2ru.org/jobs/financial-and-membership-coordinator-a2ru/

11/19/2024

Ground Works, a2ru’s peer-reviewed online platform for outstanding arts-integrated interdisciplinary research, has released a new special edition, “Creating Knowledge in Common,” focused on university-community partnered research. It is guest-edited by Kevin Hamilton and Mary Pat McGuire from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and Shannon Criss from The University of Kansas. It features nine new entries, with a tenth to be released in January.

In their introduction, the editors write: “We (Criss, Hamilton, and McGuire), currently academics working within land grant institutions, recognize the responsibility that universities bear to share resources and directly engage with publics to address needs across society in order to fulfill their institutional mission and educate their students as engaged citizens.…Ideally, knowledge drawn from diverse partners creates both common and uncommon grounds for advancing greater understanding and action on entrenched issues within both communities and institutions.”

They add: “Within collaborative partnerships, the arts and design fields facilitate creative methods for shared expression and exploration, converging multiple viewpoints into broader re-imaginings that result in advocacy, activism, and action with both rational and emotional force.”

Throughout the winter semester, a2ru will be offering a number of online events in conjunction with the edition. "Ask-Them-Anything" webinars will feature Creating Knowledge in Common Editors Shannon Criss, Kevin Hamilton, and Mary Pat McGuire as well as select contributors to this special collection, and on On February 21, 2025, “Creating Knowledge in Common, Together: A Round Table” will bring together community and university partners whose shared art- and design-centered work is published in "Creating Knowledge in Common". In keeping with the open access mission of Ground Works, all of these events are free and open to the public.

a2ru is also offering Reading Clubs and support for faculty interesting in incorporating "Creating Knowledge in Common" into their courses.

Learn more:

The issue focuses on arts-integrated, community-partnered research

11/01/2024

Arts Deans: ICFAD has extended its early bird pricing through November for its 2025 International Symposium in Qatar, taking place May 25-30. Learn more about this unique cultural experience:

ICfAD's International Symposiumin Doha, Qatar May 25 – 30, 2025 in Doha, Qatar with VCUarts Qataroptional additional cultural immersion experience in Abu Dhabi and Dubai, UAEoptional inclusion of another cultural immersion experiencein Abu Dhabi and Dubai, UAE . May 30 – June 2, 2025Online Regis...

10/30/2024

NEXT WEEK! Join us as our fall webinar series continues!

How can university arts entrepreneurship programs prepare students to craft fulfilling, multi-faceted careers amid rapidly evolving artistic, political and economic realities? What curricular and co-curricular models have proven successful–and which ones haven’t? On Thursday, November 7, from 3:00-4:30pm, a panel of arts entrepreneurship leaders will discuss "The Future(s) of Arts Entrepreneurship Education: Models to Prepare Today’s Students for Tomorrow’s Careers." This session features Osubi Craig from the UF Center for Arts, Migration + Entrepreneurship, Wen Guo from Florida State University, Jonathan Kuuskoski and Gabrielle Piazza from the University of Michigan School of Music, Theatre & Dance, David McGraw from Elon University, Sonia Montoya from the The University of Texas at Austin, and José Valentino Ruiz-Resto from the Music Business & Entrepreneurship Program at the UF College of the Artss.

Learn more and register now:

https://a2ru.org/event/the-futures-of-arts-entrepreneurship-education-models-to-prepare-todays-students-for-tomorrows-careers/

10/18/2024

At the recent BrainMind Special Forum "Your Brain on Art", Renée Fleming, the famed soprano, arts in health advocate, and co-author of "Music and Mind: Harnessing the Arts for Health and Wellness," sat down for an interview with Diana Ayton-Shenker from Leonardo/ISAST. In the conversation, she discusses her journey into neuroarts, focusing on how music and the arts can enhance brain health and wellness. She shares insights from her work with the Sound Health initiative and her advocacy for integrating arts into healthcare.

Watch now:

Renée Fleming at the BrainMind Special Forum: Your Brain on Art, interviewed by BrainMind member Diana Ayton-Shenker.Renée Fleming is an esteemed soprano and...

10/17/2024

Springboard for the Arts has expanded its Guaranteed Income for Artists pilot, making it one of the longest guaranteed income trials in the U.S., and the only one to include rural artists. The pilot will now support 100 artists, 50 in Saint Paul and 50 in Otter Tail County, MN with $500 monthly no-strings-attached payments for a total of five years each. They are also partnering with LSS Financial Counseling to provide all pilot participants with comprehensive support resources that build long-term economic stability and financial well-being including personal finance guidance, student loan debt assistance, and housing counseling.

Springboard Executive Director Laura Zabel says, "Our program is emerging as a national model, demonstrating how guaranteed income can transform artists’ lives, build community resilience, and strengthen local economies. We're not just defying political headwinds—we're changing the narrative with data, artwork, and meaningful stories of impact.When artists can focus more on their work, families art and their community instead of worrying about basic needs, everyone benefits."

Artists from the pilot are currently exhibiting work in “Exhale: Reflections on Guaranteed Income" in the Cargill Gallery at Minneapolis Central Library through November 23.

Learn more about the Guaranteed Income for Artists pilot here: https://springboardforthearts.org/guaranteed-income/

10/16/2024

As the 2024 general election approaches, two a2ru network universities--the University of Michigan and the University of Maryland--are using the arts & design to encourage students to vote.

At Michigan, the Creative Campus Voting Project has partnered with the The City Of Ann Arbor - Government clerk's office, UMMA: University of Michigan Museum of Art and the Duderstadt Center Gallery to design voting hubs on campus. The CCVP is a nonpartisan initiative based at the Stamps School of Art & Design; co-led by Stamps associate professors Stephanie Rowden and Hannah Smotrich, the CCVP employs key insights from behavioral science and rigorous attention to election law, along with a range of creative approaches to create a student voter experience that is clear, trustworthy and delightful.

At Maryland, a mobile pop-up called "VOTE (Fearlessly)!" was designed to help members of the UMD community register to vote, understand the basics of election day and voting out of state, and serve as a shared civic space around the election. Shaped like a voting booth, it’s an active space for voter education during the day; at night, the pop-up illuminates as a striking reminder of one of our greatest freedoms. "VOTE (Fearlessly)!" is participatory, with opportunities for students to share their civic pride and add to the conversation through different forms of public art. was developed by faculty, students, alums and staff from the Maryland School of Architecture, Planning & Preservation in partnership with the University of Maryland College of Arts and Humanities, TerpsVote, The The Clarice, and UMD Arts for All.

Learn more about the Creative Campus Voting Project: https://record.umich.edu/articles/culture-of-student-voting-fostered-by-design-at-u-m/

Learn more about VOTE (Fearlessly)!: https://arch.umd.edu/events/vote-fearlessly-puts-democracy-display-umd