NAER Receives NEA Funding

National Endowment for the Arts Chairman Jane Chu has approved more than $80 million in grants as part of the NEA's second major funding announcement for fiscal year 2018. Included in this announcement is an Art Works grant of $84,000 to the Newark Arts Council on behalf of the Newark Arts Education Roundtable for its planned trauma-informed care work. NAER will be partnering with the Greater Newark Healthcare Coalition and My Brother's Keeper Newark. The Art Works category is the NEA's largest funding category and supports projects that focus on the creation of art that meets the highest standards of excellence, public engagement with diverse and excellent art, lifelong learning in the arts, and/or the strengthening of communities through the arts.

"The variety and quality of these projects speaks to the wealth of creativity and diversity in our country," said NEA Chairman Jane Chu. "Through the work of organizations such as Newark Arts Education Roundtable in Newark, NJ, NEA funding invests in local communities, helping people celebrate the arts wherever they are."

"We have been looking for ways to engage the best practices of what we know arts education provides for young people with the recent advances in trauma-informed care. This grant will marry those efforts, already ongoing in Newark," says NAER Director Lauren Meehan.

The initiative will, over two years, create a shared learning community of both arts education and healthcare professionals, encouraging cross-sector partnerships, widening the reach of the arts into another collective impact initiative that also endeavors to improve the lives of children, and share best practices that exist in both sectors.

For more information on projects included in the NEA grant announcement, visit arts.gov/news.

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