Arts Network for Children and Youth (ANCY) was founded in 2001 by Linda Albright. It is a national community arts resource, specific to children and youth arts based programs in the community and primarily outside of the school. Its mandate is to 1. conduct community development, 2. influence policy and affect change within the children’s and youth art sector 3. be an arts service organization in order to enable cultural progress.
ANCY has been instrumental in getting small pockets of funding for the arts sector for children and youth ( for example: ArtReach Toronto.) It has numerous active collaborative partnerships. ANCY sits on several national and provincial boards where it shares reports about what’s happening in the sector; the challenges, as well as progress. ANCY reaches politicians, elected officials, and policy staff. It networks people so that they can connect with and mentor each other within the sector. Reports and case studies can be found on the ANCY website.
ANCY’s outreach mandate is to source resources in order for children and youth to get more access to arts at the local level. It also seeks to facilitate greater awareness in the field. As an established community art resource with years of knowledge and experience, it is interested in partnering or doing outreach with other community arts projects/programs/organizations/resources. ANCY’s catchment area is national in scope. It actively contributes at forums, conferences, round tables and meetings both federally and provincially.
ANCY’s goals this year are: strengthening their staff base, increasing community development, and working with funders to build a broader funding base for arts programming within the sector. Additionally, their greatest goal is to complete their policy document/ tool kit. It explains the « what, why, how » for the children’s and youths arts sector. It contains research on infrastructure and program examples, staffing requirements (skills and training), as well as case studies. It is intended to be a tool kit for local communities and provinces that want to move in this direction. ANCY is also are planning to establish a forum to exchange information and share stories. It could use some support with additional resources « to move forward and do the work. »
ANCY’s language of service is predominantly English (some French.) It serves/works with children and youth from ages 3-30. It has offices in Tillsonburg and Toronto, Ontario. ANCY has a board of directors. It has 1 full time staff, part time contract staff are employed as needed and as funding allows. All arts disciplines are represented.
ArtBridges interview with Executive Director Linda Albright on January 25th 2010.
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