Everett Art Center Secures Multiyear Grant to Sustain Program for Youth Touched by Juvenile Justice System

The Schack Art Center in Everett will be able to keep running an arts program for young people involved with the juvenile justice system, thanks to a grant of more than $500,000 from a Seattle-based philanthropic organization.

The money comes from Allen Family Philanthropies, which distributed $5 million to organizations around Washington state for projects tied to creative youth development. Anh Nguyen, the foundation's director of arts, youth and communities, described the approach as one that combines current understanding of how young people develop with processes that build skills over time.

Nguyen distinguished the approach from traditional arts instruction. "Arts is like a tool, if you think of it that way, for well-being, for connection, those sorts of things," Nguyen said, adding that this differs from arts education, which can concentrate more on building artistic skills.

The three-year grant will support the art center's existing Art Alternatives program, which offers weekly art classes to young people at the Denney Juvenile Justice Center in north Everett. According to Raedle Alburn, the art center's executive director, the program has operated for 30 years.

Classes cover a range of media, including glass blowing, clay, murals, calligraphy, painting and mosaics. Alburn said the aim is to let young people tied to the justice system take part in creative work in a way that treats them as individuals. The art center also provides paid internships for those who want to stay involved in art programs after their initial court-mandated participation ends. "It creates space for them to build relationships, to build creativity, to learn new skills, to feel valued and be seen," Alburn said.

The timing proved helpful. The art center had relied for years on federal funding to help run the program, but that money was set to expire in September.

Alburn said she hopes the program can help lower recidivism and reduce the number of young people who become involved with the justice system to begin with. "Create more opportunities for youth to be involved in positive activities, and they're going to decrease negative activities," she said, adding that this should happen in places where young people often lack such opportunities.

Henri Wilson has taught classes for the young people for more than three decades. A calligrapher who previously owned her own letter arts business, Wilson said she hopes to build relationships with students and help them develop skills that open possibilities they may not have known existed. She called the grant encouraging. "Anytime when you're pushing to keep something working, having someone come alongside and say 'Oh, yes we share that vision,' is just really encouraging," she said.

Wilson said the instructors learn from the students as well. "In our work we get to realize there is more than one layer to each story, that everyone deserves a chance to be heard and learn new things," she wrote in an email. "Their individual stories are complicated and unique; what happens to them now can impact them for life too which can be a reason for continuing what we do."

The program is open to young people affected by the juvenile justice system, including those who are no longer in detention.