Dear Teaching Artists, Staff, Committee Members and Arts For All Community,
I am writing to you today with some important information about the COVID-19 Pandemic and some important information from Arts For All. First, we are wishing all of you health, safety, and peace during this very challenging time. I know we are all striving to continue to provide quality programming to the children we serve, as our organization is such an important part of young people’s lives in New York City. Our organization would like for everyone to be aware of the following:
- We are currently following the DOE when it comes to making decisions about our programming. Given that the Mayor has announced that all NYC schools are closed, through the remainder of 2019-2020 school year, ARTS FOR ALL PROGRAMMING WILL ALSO BE CANCELLED THROUGH THE END OF THE 2019-2020 SCHOOL YEAR. For more information from the DOE specifically and the DOE’s response to the COVID-19 Pandemic, please visit: DOE Coronavirus Updates
- We know this is an incredibly difficult time for Teaching Artists. With this in mind, if your Arts For All residency has been postponed or cancelled due to the COVID-19 Pandemic, Arts For All will pay you for up to 2 weeks of your scheduled workshops with Arts For All. While this is not an easy choice for a small non-profit, we feel it is imperative given the amount of hard work and dedication you have provided to our community. A scheduled workshop is defined as a workshop or residency for which you have already received an assignment sheet prior to cancellations, and that specifically gets postponed or cancelled due to COVID-19. If you fall into this category, please include two weeks of your scheduled workshops on your next invoice to Arts For All. Please note on the invoice the weeks that are being paid out due to the COVID-19 Pandemic. If you have specific questions about this, please contact me directly.
- We are working to provide remote online learning opportunities for some partner organizations, as well as provide learning opportunities through our social media networks. Currently, we have been posting interactive learning videos via Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. As of mid-April, we have begun distributing resources to youth partners.
- We are continuing to make efforts to provide take home / remote materials for children normally receiving Arts For All programming. We will be reaching out to some of you individually, but if you have an idea for an easy take-home project for students in line with your specific arts discipline, please contact Brennan or me directly. We will be paying some teaching artists to create these materials over the next week. It is our hope to not only be able to provide this to some of our students directly, but also to provide these resources online for parents, educators, and students.
- Effective immediately, until further notice, Arts For All administrative staff will be working remotely.
While we will not be going back to any scheduled in-person programming for the remainder of the school year, some items you should be aware of when residencies are able to start back up. Since most of our Teaching Artists are in contact with multiple people each day they teach for Arts For All, and are often traveling on the subways and buses, we are asking all Teaching Artists to take as many proactive actions as possible to prevent exposure, even after schools reopen and we are able to restart programming, including:
- Thoroughly clean and disinfect surfaces you come in directly contact with.
- Disinfect keyboards, phones and other surfaces you are working on at least twice per day.
- Wash hands before and after every workshop. (Make sure to use soap and warm/hot water and lather for 20 seconds – that’s about the time it takes to sing happy birthday twice!)
- In lieu of washing, you can also clean hands with a 70% alcohol-based hand sanitizer.
- Avoid touching eyes, nose, and mouth when at work
- Stay home if you have any symptoms of acute respiratory illness until you are free of fever (100.4° F or greater) and any other symptoms for at least 24 hours, without the use of fever-reducing or other symptom-altering medicines (e.g. cough suppressants). Please contact your Program Manager if you need to stay home.
- Stay home if someone in your household or someone you care for is displaying any symptoms. Please contact your Program Manager if you need to stay home.
- Talk to Arts For All Program Manager, Brennan O’Rourke, or Arts For All Executive Director, Anna Roberts Ostroff if you feel uncomfortable resuming programming when schools reopen.
New Yorkers can text COVID to 692-692 to get regular updates on the latest developments regarding COVID-19.
CLICK HERE FOR A LINK TO ARTS FOR ALL’S RESOURCE COMPILATION
Sincerely,
Anna Roberts Ostroff
Executive Director
Arts For All
