Creative Bridges In Sonoma Valley an organization called Creative Bridges—online at creativebridges.org —is working to reinvigorate arts education in the schools. They’re doing it with an alliance of people and organizations who are collectively working toward the same goal of getting the arts to all students in the community. Founding member and co-chair Connie Schlelein says the Creative Bridges alliance began to loosely take shape in 2018. “It was a twinkle in many of our eyes as we realized there was synchronicity in our speaking about how many arts organizations in the valley and the public wanted arts education,” she says.
“But a lot of these organizations were working in their own silos,” Schlelein says. Since officially launching in 2021, Creative Bridges has provided a way for all such entities to work together to help create the change they want to see. The alliance strategically advocates for strong arts education in the schools. Schlelein co-chairs the organization along with Sonoma Valley Unified School District arts teacher Cheryl Coldiron, also a founding member of CB. The two working together help form an alliance between the community and school district, and it’s one of the many powerful partnerships within the organization. “We have helped show SVUSD the huge public will the entire community has for arts education in this valley,” Schlelein says. “As solution partners, CB has worked with the district’s visual and performing arts teachers to help them develop a strategic roadmap to improve and expand arts education.” The alliance itself is not a provider of arts programs or services. “Some of the alliance organizations individually provide services to the community or the schools—with teaching artists, after-school visual and performing arts instruction and showcases,” Schlelein says. Many of the alliance’s arts organizations were previously competing with one another in their fundraising and arts activities. Its members now have an opportunity to build community among themselves, creating relationships with one another and working together in their efforts. “Bottom line, we ask if what we’re doing is good for kids,” Schlelein says. “Everything else we can figure out because we’re creative people, so we’ll figure it out.” Schlelein is a retired arts educator who has served as vice president of the National Art Education Association. When she moved to the area from Colorado she realized that California’s schools were suffering from the fallout of Prop. 13, which led to lowered funding for arts education in California schools. She wanted to help. She began by working with Creative Sonoma, the County
Creative Bridges helps Sonoma Valley School District visual and performing arts teachers expand arts education. Above, Sonoma Valley High School theater students in a production of ‘The Addams Family.’
of Sonoma’s arts division, in its efforts to create a strategic master arts plan: the Sonoma County Framework. Schlelein then focused her efforts on the Sonoma Valley area when she realized that many of her neighbors had the same vision to reinvigorate the arts curriculum in local schools. “In these past few years, one coffee at a time, we have shown people that school districts can change and it takes collective impact,” Schlelein says. “It takes a community, a whole community coming together and speaking for what they want.” Schlelein concedes that people can become “frustrated with institutions,” but believes CB’s most important achievement is its ability to bridge groups. “We’re Creative Bridges,” she says. “It’s not just a bridge over one thing. It’s a multidimensional bridge to all these organizations and all these parts of the community, so that we can improve things for kids. “This isn’t just me, this is collective, it is collaboration, these relationships,” Schlelein says. Currently the alliance includes around 47 organizations and individual members and that number is continually growing. This includes nonprofits, arts for profits, interior designers, consultants, art galleries, art museums, dance studios, theater companies and more. Schlelein said that many of the businesses involved are not arts-related, but they know that the arts are important for the community, for creativity and critical thinking. Schlelein is also a member of Sonoma’s Cultural and Fine Arts Commission and in December she gave a presentation to the city’s Parks, Recreation and Open Space Commission about creating community that supports the creative economy. In 2015, Americans for the Arts included Sonoma County in its Arts & Economic Prosperity 5 national study of the economic impact of the nonprofit arts and culture industry. According to the study, $80.4 million had been generated in annual economic activity in Sonoma County by 42 nonprofit
50 NorthBaybiz
January 2024
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