The Arts Congress is a critical professional development component of the celebrated Los Angeles County Arts Internship Program. It’s a daylong event during which interns meet with artists, arts administrators, and policy makers to find out how they create arts programs, carry out their organizational missions and implement arts policies to affect the communities in which they work.

This year, Arts for LA had the opportunity to conduct six sessions on advocacy. Knowing that we couldn’t possibly do it in on our own, we called in reinforcements - key movers and shakers of the Emerging Arts Leaders Network to help.

In what could have been a very dry presentation on cultural policy in a fragmented landscape, these four innovators took a creative approach and conducted the sessions, ala “workshop style” with lots of participant engagement. Sure, they had to get through the nuts and bolts of what’s the difference between advocating and lobbying and whether or not 501(c)(3) organizations can lobby, (which of course we all know they can lobby up to 20% of the annual operating budget for the first $500,000 and up to 15% for the next $500,000 as long as IRS Form 5768 is completed). They set out with an extremely ambitious agenda to inform, inspire and mobilize every person that walked into their session. And they did it with such infectious enthusiasm, commitment and creativity that by the last session each group not only had a better understanding of what advocacy is, they learned how they can be a part of an incredible strategic effort that’s already gaining momentum bravo team!

The icing on the cake…? Each intern was invited to write a personal note to their County Supervisor thanking them for the opportunity to participate in the arts internship program. Just about every one of the interns did just that. Then, they received a complimentary membership to Arts for LA and the Americans for the Arts Action Fund.

After all, why reinvent the wheel, when you can simply just invite more to the party.

Special thanks to Arts for LA’s LA County Intern Julius Crowe Hampton for contributing to the workshop content and structure and to the fantastic CARS staff who once again put on a highly engaging day!