the program
Creative Fields is an arts apprenticeship program that brings teens + transitional-aged youth together with local creative professionals for 30 weeks of paid mentorship and arts career experience.
Teaching Artists open up their studio spaces to share their artmaking practices, career knowledge and mentor youth as they gain hands-on experience in a wide range of creative disciplines.
A longitudinal NEA study found youth with sustained arts education had markedly higher career aspirations and college attendance than peers with limited arts exposure.
Creative Fields primarily serves youth with neurodivergences, diverse mental health needs and/or conduct disorders such as PTSD, ADHD, and Generalized Anxiety Disorder, among others. We understand that while these needs may inhibit youth’s participation in traditional classroom environments, they are also approaches to learning that make them uniquely suited to creative thinking.
support for youth
Our learning spaces are designed to accommodate diverse learning styles and needs, staffed by Teaching Artists who approach students as capable, creative individuals rather than problems to be managed.
Research shows contact with professional artists builds creative self-efficacy, widens career knowledge, and fortifies youth's sense of identity and belonging.
support for teaching artists
Teaching Artists receive intensive mentorship + professional development and support writing engaging, inclusive workshops.
We align Teaching Artists' compensation with Working Artists and the Greater Economy (W.A.G.E.) standards, a nonprofit that establishes and advocates for equitable pay rates for creative professionals.
We invest significant time preparing Teaching Artists to meet the needs of youth participants.
Professional development for Creative Fields focuses on youth-centered curriculum design, with a directed focus on positive behavior support and inclusive approaches to learning.
Teaching Artists develop lesson plans for four-workshop series to be held in artists’ studio spaces. Each workshop is aligned with CA State Visual and Performing Arts standards and begins with an artist lecture that highlights important facets of their career paths, includes information about their avenues of income, and shares methods of building financial sustainability into their creative paths.