The mission of Think 360 Arts for Learning is to lead Colorado in cultivating and sustaining the arts as essential to all learning through creative experiences for students and teachers. Our vision is a community that embraces the arts as a fundamental tool to enhance learning.
The mission of Think 360 Arts for Learning is to lead Colorado in cultivating and sustaining the arts as essential to all learning through creative experiences for students and teachers.
Our vision is a community that embraces the arts as a fundamental tool to enhance learning.
Think 360 Arts for Learning, YoungAudiences' Colorado affiliate, was founded in 1963 to bring high-quality arts education programs to K-12 students. Since it was founded, Think 360 has evolved beyond school programming to bring artistic engagement to all communities in Colorado, inspiring creativity, building community and advancing equity. The trauma, social isolation and disparities resulting from the pandemic created an increased need for connection and creative engagement to promote mental wellbeing. In response, Think360's staff and teaching artists quickly adapted programming to meet community needs and provide much needed employment opportunities for artists. For example, staff and artists pivoted to virtual programming, online videos, physical art kits, parking lot performances and more. Also, in response to community need, Think 360 created a social-emotional learning and arts integration framework for artist residencies. To facilitate these adaptations,Think 360 bolstered support for artists through intensive trainings, technical support and wellness checks. Regardless of the audience, each program is customized, and collaboratively developed, to ensure that it addresses the unique needs of constituents.
"Creativity is surely the most valuable thing we have as humans and the only thing we possess which can never be given or taken away - the power of promise and potential to imagine things from nothing; the power to make things better, more efficient, more valuable. Creativity is about connecting the dots and linking disparate ideas. It is also a skill, a mental 'muscle' that needs development, practice, and strengthening from the earliest of ages. Personally, my creativity is a place of excitement and inspiration, as well as professional reward. To these ends, a complete arts education places creativity as the foundation of our children's development and is vital to making our citizenry valuable, productive, and successful in society. Creativity is singularly the future of humanity, and we cannot afford to ignore it. Think 360 Arts is entirely dedicated to this future and is why I am passionately involved."
-Michael Mowry, former Board Co-Chair, Think 360 Arts
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"You bring all of us a sense of renewed purpose, artistic excitement, and infinite collaboration opportunities through the networking that you facilitate. Most importantly, and what none of us like to admit we ever need, you make us feel validated in the work that we are doing on a daily basis. As we wear down, this becomes most necessary for there to be a next; class, day, week, month, year, or even decade to want to re-charge for." - Educator
