If you’re a Kentucky teacher and you want to schedule a field trip to a museum or play, bring in an artist for a residency with your classroom, schedule a performing artist to visit your school or take advantage of other arts education programs, the Kentucky Arts Council offers many educational opportunity grants for the fall semester.

TranspARTation
Would you like to take your students on more field trips to arts venues – like galleries, museums or performing arts centers – but the cost for transportation is too prohibitive? The arts council’s popular TranspARTation grant can provide assistance for transportation costs to arts venues. Grant awards are based on mileage from the school building to the venue and the number of buses necessary. Grant requests under $100 are ineligible.

Teachers, please note that the deadline for this grant – Sept. 13 – will be the only one this fiscal year. The arts council has scaled back the number of TranspARTation deadlines from three to one in order to streamline the administration of this grant program.

Poetry Out Loud
For the 12th consecutive year, the arts council will co-sponsor the Poetry Out Loud state finals with the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) and the Poetry Foundation.

Poetry Out Loud is a national poetry recitation competition created by the NEA and the Poetry Foundation and administered in partnership with state arts agencies. Each participating school receives an artist residency and the opportunity for the school’s champion to attend the state competition – along with a chaperone – in Frankfort. The state champion advances to the national competition in Washington, D.C.

The program is open to all Kentucky high schools, public and private. Home-schooled students may compete through a participating local high school or a home school regional competition sponsored by a local library or community center.

The deadline for teachers to apply for participation is Sept. 15.

Arts First Aid
A relatively new arts council grant program, Arts First Aid is open to grades pre-K through 12 at any Kentucky public school that has received a less than proficient score (under 8) on the Visual and Performing Arts assessment by the Kentucky Department of Education for the 2015-16 school year.

Through a partnership between the Kentucky Arts Council and the Kentucky Department of Education. Arts First Aid provides Kentucky school administrators, teachers and students with high-quality intensive arts education experiences that align curriculum with the Kentucky Academic Standards for the Arts.

The benefits of Arts First Aid include:

  • Technical-assistance consultancies utilizing the arts council’s Specialists with Arts Tactics (SWAT) program, which include consultation with arts education professionals who assist Kentucky schools in developing plans and assessment tools for integrating the arts throughout the curriculum. Schools can benefit from the experience of seasoned arts education consultants collaborating with faculty members to create an arts curriculum geared toward student success.
  • Teaching Arts Together artist residencies, which allow teachers to collaborate with practicing, professional artists on the design and implementation of artist residencies, and provide teachers the tools to continue to incorporate the arts into the curriculum after the residency is completed.
  • Showcasing the Arts school performance/presentations, which are high-quality in-school arts experiences or after-school co-curricular experiences. This program lets students see artists performing or demonstrating their craft, ask questions and gain knowledge about their creative process.

The application deadline is Sept. 18.

Showcasing the Arts
Another relatively new grant program offered by the arts council is Showcasing the Arts, which allows Kentucky teachers and schools to offer students high-quality arts in-school experiences or after-school co-curricular experiences, enhanced by artist lecture/demonstrations regarding the creative process.

Projects demonstrate creating, performing/producing/presenting, responding and connecting, as specified in the Kentucky Academic Standards for the Arts and English Language Arts. Grants will provide artists’ fees. Schools are required to provide space, technical arrangements and artists’ travel reimbursement. This program provides interactive and introspective discussion with professional artists.

The application deadline is Oct. 2.

Teaching Art Together
The Teaching Art Together grant lets teachers collaborate with practicing, professional artists on the design and implementation of innovative one- to four-week residencies. Residencies provide teachers with the tools to continue to incorporate the arts into the curriculum after the residency is completed.

The grant is available to any teacher or group of teachers currently teaching pre-K through grade 12 in a Kentucky public or private school.

The application deadline is Oct. 16.