Craft Lake City is pleased to announce a new creative entrepreneurial program for youth being offered this spring at two afterschool sites in Salt Lake County. The Craft Lake City Youth Artisan Entrepreneur Program is made possible through funding provided by the Utah Afterschool Network and the Falbaum-Caillet Family Foundation. The program provides free, enriching afterschool arts programming to elementary aged youth, while preparing them to exhibit at Kid Row, the youth entrepreneur vendor section of the 14th Annual Craft Lake City® DIY Festival® Presented By Harmons.
“Craft Lake City’s youth programming inspires and empowers kids to begin exploring, experimenting, and creating works of their own and even participating in the local creative economy,” says Angela H. Brown, Executive Director of Craft Lake City. “We are thrilled to expand our youth enrichment programming for 2022 with the help of Falbaum-Caillet Family Foundation and the Utah Afterschool Network!”
For the inaugural year of the Youth Artisan Entrepreneur Program, Craft Lake City is partnering with Promise South Salt Lake’s Hser Ner Moo Community Center and Backman Elementary School to provide a series of afterschool artisan and entrepreneurial workshops for twenty-four students. The series provides hands-on learning from established local artisans across four different artistic mediums, with “lab” days in between each instructional workshop to allow students to spend more time working with each medium while creating products they can sell as Kid Row vendors at the 14th Annual Craft Lake City DIY Festival Presented By Harmons this August.
“Backman Elementary currently has no art teacher. Instead, many of our teachers try to incorporate some art into their classroom curriculum. Craft Lake City is making it possible for our students who have a desire to learn and express themselves through arts and craft instruction more indepthly to do so as a no-cost extracurricular activity,” says Ines Lazalde, Backman Elementary School Counselor.
In addition to the art instruction, Craft Lake City staff will work with students on their entrepreneurial skills, including writing a business pitch, completing a DIY Fest exhibitor application, designing their Kid Row booth layout, and role playing interacting with customers and conducting financial transactions. The final step of their entrepreneurial instruction will be participation in Kid Row this August, which will allow the kids to put their new business skills into action in a real-world festival setting while celebrating their creative accomplishments and earning money! The Backman Elementary students will be pooling the proceeds of their sales to donate to charity and to purchase more art supplies.
“This program will give these students the opportunity to explore entrepreneurship first-hand, learning valuable skills and lessons at a young age. Our hope is that this program will be the spark of interest for these kids to continue to grow and develop as creatives and entrepreneurs,” says Ben Trentelman, Executive Director of Utah Afterschool Network.
These twenty-four students will spend months building their own creative small business from the ground up—from sourcing funding, to creating products, to actually interacting with customers and selling their wares at a major arts festival. Through this innovative and enriching extracurricular arts program made possible by Utah Afterschool Network and Falbaum-Caillet Family Foundation, all participants will receive materials and supplies needed to create their artwork and inventory, application and exhibitor fee waivers, and admission and food vouchers for the DIY Fest for themselves and their families.
“The Youth Artisan Entrepreneur Program provides these kids a glimpse into the life of a working artist, inspiring them to consider the arts as a viable career pursuit. Students will have the opportunity to explore entrepreneurship first-hand while interacting with local arts professionals. Our hope is that this program will spark a life-long love of the arts for these kids, inspiring them to keep learning and creating,” says Barrett Falbaum, Board Member, Falbaum-Caillet Family Foundation.
“We are really excited to be a partner location for this program with Craft Lake City. This dynamic and engaging programming provides youth not only an opportunity to have art instruction from some of the community’s most talented artists, but also gain valuable entrepreneurial skills that will stay with them throughout life, no matter what future career they may have,” says Kelli Meranda, Director of Promise South Salt Lake. “The family engagement component of the program is also particularly invaluable. The free admission tickets and meal vouchers that are provided to families will help to ensure that they can participate fully and comfortably, regardless of income.”