Operating Support
ACHF Arts Access
A Center for the Arts will continue to improve as a professional organization offering only the highest quality entertainment and experiences to our patrons and performers. Our volunteers and paid personnel will continue ongoing training in phone etiquette, special needs, and box office operations as well as house management, ushering, and stage management, and we will provide technical workshops to improve the experience for patrons and performers. Our volunteer core and staff will attend no less than two training sessions each. A majority of the training will take place prior to events, making this an achievable goal. Survey monkey was used for patrons attending our major season and a vast majority who replied were pleased with the diversity, cost, and schedule of artists. We are still working on the percentages but feel we are better able to accommodate our patrons by doing fewer shows. More people are coming to fewer shows and the combination is helping our bottom line. Video of the kindergarten mosh pit during Terrance Simenon on the school Web site shows the excitement by students, teachers, staff and performers. The increase number of assistive listening devices used at every show, as well as the number of patrons using our accessible seating area, has surprised everyone. The autistic community attended the Tony Deblois concert with a block of over 20 seats. We will continue to pursue new ways to be inclusive.
From free concerts in the park to all school performances, from children's theatre to audio described performances and the hundreds of other programing choices we make we continue to increase the number of ages, ethnicities and abilities that participate both as patrons and performers at A Center for the Arts. This past year we saw an increase in the number of patrons attending performances; we did several all school performances as well as numerous workshops; we partnered with special education classes and students who performed for their classmates and the public on our stage; we saw an increase from tens to hundreds of people attending our free concerts in the park and partnered with a local company to show movies in the park after the concerts, calling it Fergus Falls biggest pajama party. We added new rehearsal spaces and are renting space to eight area artists.
Other
local or private