"I wouldn't have been able to continue to study music without ArtHouse," says Caitlin. Caitlin is now studying for her Grade 10 Royal Conservatory of Music piano exam after achieving a spectacular 90 on her Grade 9 test.
"My mom is disabled and can't work and is a single parent; we just couldn't have afforded it." Click here for Caitlyn's story in her own words.
It's not hard to imagine how, with such a background, optimism and the self-confidence to make a good life for herself and contribute to society might have eluded Caitlyn. But we don't have to worry about what might have been, thanks to ArtHouse, a United Way agency that believes art is an essential part of all of our lives and should be a part of every child's education.
"Art and music can take a child and show them a road to possibility," says Don Pangman, Executive Director of ArtHouse. "A child who has experienced poverty, trauma, drug abuse or violence can be transported into a world of beauty, creativity and hope."
Don founded ArtHouse after a Bay St. career led to serving on the United Way campaign cabinet, starting as leadership chair and eventually running the whole campaign as Chair. He then served on the United Way board. "Looking at all the other wonderful agencies we supported, I saw a major gap that needed to be filled, and that if I could help, it could have a ripple effect on the work of every other agency helping children. The power of art to build skills and self-esteem is well-established. Disadvantaged children need it more than others, and yet the arts are poorly funded in the schools, and they don't have access to paid extracurricular programmes."
ArtHouse's vision is supported by hard academic research. "Reported benefits of the arts include deeper development of the imagination, greater motivation to learn, increased achievement in mathematics and language, enhanced neural activity in the brain, greater student creativity, lower dropout rates, and positively enhanced social skills." (Arts Education for the Development of the Whole Child, Dr. Rena Upitis, Professor of Arts Education, Queen's University). Don says he is particularly inspired in ArtHouse's mission by the work of Sir Kenneth Robinson, who talks about the Arts Paradigm as the transformative shift that is needed to make our legacy educations systems fit for the modern world.
ArtHouse is the only organization of its type in Halton, offering Arts programming to children from 7-17 who couldn't access extracurricular activities otherwise for socio-economic reasons or who have experienced some kind of trauma. The Reach out Centre for Kids (ROCK), another United Way agency, is one source of referrals, but high schools also come to ArtHouse for arts programming when children cannot fit into the regular stream of arts instruction.
"We look for the thing which will light up the individual child. It might be musical theatre, improv, cooking, or expressing their concerns about the world and the environment through visual media, like the canoe garden installation outside Oakville Town Hall, which was done by kids through ArtHouse."
ArtHouse supports a Gary Allan programme in partnership with the HDSB and Kerr Street Mission. With ArtHouse's help, one young boy learned illustration: the result was an outstanding English project and motivation to stay in school.
"Teaching arts-based programming to children, because of its uplifting characteristics, is a tangible expression of love and telling a child we really care about them," says Don. "It's a way of helping children not fall through the cracks, helping them acquire the sense of self-worth to become independent, caring citizens in their own right."
Research in Europe has shown that exposure to art education and to artists reduces the search for self-esteem through violence or gang membership. Similar experiences have produced results in Toronto. "The cost of a truly positive impact on 50 kids? Approximately $40,000. If this program deterred even one of those young people – many of whom are not in school – from joining a gang, it saved the taxpayers half of the $80,000 price tag to lock up one youth for a year," wrote Lola Rasminsky, Executive Director of Arts for Children in Toronto, in "A better way to influence 14-year-olds" - Toronto Star - October 8-2008.
"The creativity that art encourages provides the capability they need to create a path to resiliency and self-reliance," Don emphasizes.
Like other organizations, ArtHouse had to find ways to go virtual during the pandemic to maintain the connection with the children who were on a path to healthy lives with their help but might fall backwards without them. "United Way really came through as we dealt with COVID-19," says Don.
In addition to pandemic funding, the relationships with other United Way agencies have helped ArtHouse be effective. ROCK and Halton Multicultural Council refer children, and ArtHouse also helps the older siblings of children in the HIPPY Halton programme. ArtHouse has about 500 children in its various programmes in a normal year, some attending multiple programmes. "That is barely the tip of the iceberg. At least 25,000 children in Halton could use our services, but limited resources, and the importance to us of connecting individually with each child, mean we can only give so many children this incredibly significant leg up in life."
Many of us have charities we support for personal reasons. However, there is a wide variety of needs in our community. The United Way goes to great lengths to identify these needs and find and assist vital agencies with good processes to address them. United Way funds mean these agencies can spend more of their resources helping Oakville residents and less of them looking for money. As donors, we can't know the best way to spread our donations around, but donations of all sizes from many Oakvilleans can be turned to their best effect through the United Way. And who knows when we, or someone close to us, will need help from one of these services. Our donations to the United Way ensure they will all be there for us if that day comes.
