Open studio is expanding to four days

Starting February 2, open studio expands from three afternoons to four. It will run Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, 5:00–6:00, at every site that has a workshop or a studio. The change is the result of a kid petition, a staff vote, and a budget conversation that took three months.

Why

Open studio was the most requested change in the fall kid survey — 23 kids wrote it in, unprompted, which is more than any other single answer. The kid board seats brought it to the board in October. The board asked two questions: what does it cost, and who supervises it?

The answer to the first is $41,000 a year, mostly staff hours. The answer to the second is the existing program staff, with one additional part-time assistant at Montavilla and Lents. We are funding the first year from the fall appeal, which came in $18,000 over goal, and from a $25,000 grant from the Rivergrass Fund that was not earmarked for anything specific.

What it means for kids

• Kids in a Monday or Wednesday program can now stay for open studio on those days without giving up a second program.
• Thursday open studio is new and will be run by the teen leadership cohort, with a staff member present.
• The repair bench and the sewing bank are available every open studio day, not just Friday.
• Kids on the waitlist still cannot attend open studio. It is for enrolled kids only. We know. We are sorry.

What we are watching

Three things: attendance on Thursdays, whether the teen-led model holds up, and whether the extra hour pushes cleanup past 6:00 (it should not; cleanup starts at 5:45 as always). We will report back in the spring letter with actual numbers, including the ones that are embarrassing.

Read about open studio →