Endowment

Our vision is to make the Clay Center accessible to a wide audience of visitors – to provide every West Virginia school the opportunity to send its children to the Center without charge and to provide broad access to the community for our programming in the performing and visual arts and sciences. 

To accomplish this, a fundraising initiative is taking place to increase the Center’s permanent endowment by $3 million in FYE2011.  These additional endowment funds will help to boost access to Clay Center programs, as well as grow and perpetuate a variety of existing programs and activities.  Specifically, the funds will be used to allow free access to the Center’s museum for school groups, provide free workshops and lectures in the visual and performing arts and sciences to the community, and allow the Center to meet unexpected, as well as daily, operational expenses. 

Free Museum Admission for School Groups (Free Access) Endowment Fund

To help allow the Clay Center’s museum to become free to visiting student groups, you may contribute to the Free Museum Admission for School Groups Endowment Fund.

The Clay Center’s Avampato Discovery Museum stands among this country’s best arts and sciences exhibitions and educational programs for communities of our size.  Because of significant public funding, many other museums are able to offer their exhibitions at no charge to the general public through free access.  The Clay Center strives to take its place among these museums by providing free access to the Center’s educational experiences to school children who visit on field trips.  Eliminating admission fees for schools and their children removes the financial barriers of experiencing the wonders of the galleries and will make the Center accessible to thousands of additional students every year. 

Community Outreach Program Endowment Fund

To allow the Center’s arts and science programs to be experienced by all, you may contribute to the Community Outreach Program Endowment Fund.

The Clay Center is committed to developing the creative potential of West Virginia’s children and adults.  To do this the Center has initiated a new Community Outreach Program,  a community-based, open-access instruction program in music, theater, media, visual arts, and sciences that focuses on providing opportunities to underserved audiences,  specifically urban and rural youth and seniors.  The long-range vision for community outreach is to build internal capacity and partnerships which will offer private and group lessons; interactive workshops in the performing and visual arts and sciences to onsite and remote audiences; web-based training; master classes; summer academies; and lectures in the arts and sciences for adult audiences.

A previous $5 million gift has allowed the Clay Center to establish this Community Outreach Program endowment.  This gift is specifically focused on providing music programs to West Virginians in remote areas of the state.  With these initial funds, the Clay Center is providing music instruction to children in six counties who would not otherwise be able to afford to participate.

Arts and Sciences Education

To help the Clay Center to provide enhanced educational programs to the schools and for the general public, both onsite and at remote locations, you may contribute to the Endowment Fund for Arts and Sciences Education.

West Virginia has an abundance of natural resources, but its most precious resource is its children.  The benefits of the arts for young people have been emphasized in national studies on arts education.  Exposure to the arts correlates positively with academic achievement in both math and science.  Art education also may enhance leadership skills, encourage creative expression, strengthen appreciation of reading, and lead to increased participation in community service.  Similarly, what children learn through the study of the sciences increases their abilities to become critical, independent thinkers, promotes communication and research skills, and hones conflict management strategies.  Unfortunately in today’s educational climate, few schools devote precious resources to these important topics.

The Clay Center is in an excellent position to supplement arts and sciences education in West Virginia.  Through summer and school-year programs, it gives disadvantaged children opportunities to make and play their own instruments, create murals showcasing themes of community identity, or exhibit mixed media works in the Clay Center’s lobby. Thus, students are exhilarated through creativity while sensing pride for their accomplishments.  Over 300,000 school children throughout West Virginia, Ohio, Kentucky, Virginia, and North Carolina have participated in these programs by visiting the Center.  The Clay Center also provides training and other educational opportunities to teachers from school districts all across the region, focusing on hands-on learning techniques for the arts and sciences. 

Additionally, the Clay Center’s distance education program was conceived to bring its arts and sciences programming to all areas of West Virginia and beyond.  The Center has developed partnerships with NASA and the National Radio Astronomy Observatory in Green Bank, West Virginia, and dozens of local school districts to provide quality programming that originates from the Clay Center and is transmitted to remote sites.  Since the beginning of this distance education program, thousands of individuals have been able to experience the Clay Center without ever setting foot in its magnificent facility. 

To sustain and grow its education programs for both students and teachers, the Clay Center seeks its endowment focused on enhancing our public schools’ 21st Century Learning Skills programs for the state’s students and teachers, both at the Clay Center and through our high-quality distance education programs.

Performing Arts

To enhance the Center’s capacity to bring world famous performers and fresh new artists to our audiences, you may contribute to the Endowment Fund for the Performing Arts.

Outstanding artists such as Tony Bennett, Willie Nelson, Harry Connick, Jr. and James Taylor have played to sold-out crowds.  Other featured performances have included the Harlem Gospel Choir, Bill Cosby, Vince Gill, John Legend, and the Charleston Light Opera Guild production of Disney’s High School Musical.

The Performing Arts Program at the Clay Center adds a special dimension to its mission and differentiates it from other science and art museums or cultural centers around the country.  The Center’s performances are attended by people throughout West Virginia and other surrounding states.  Many headline performers, however, command a substantial fee which, without subsidies, would increase ticket prices and prevent many local citizens from attending.  In order for ticket prices to remain affordable, the Center is creating an endowment to underwrite the expenses of performing artists to keep the cost of attendance at affordable levels for the general public. 

The Everyday and Unexpected

To allow the Center to be prepared for emergency situations and cover the expenses associated with daily operational overhead, as well as deferred maintenance, you may make an unrestricted gift to the endowment.  

Keeping an organization like the Clay Center operating everyday requires considerable expenses for everything from maintaining the building and grounds to ensuring that enough qualified gallery educators are available to serve visitors.  Insurance and security for the Center’s art collection, caring for its permanent exhibits, and cleaning more than 240,000 square feet of space are just a few of the expenses it will always have.  The costs to bring in traveling exhibitions and performing headliners only add to the normal operating expenses.  There are also unexpected needs for emergency repairs when an elevator or air conditioning unit stops working.  All together, these costs can mount up quickly.  In order to have an adequate pool of funds to cover these daily operational costs and emergency needs, the Center requires an unrestricted endowment fund.

How can you help?
Your gift in any size or form will help give much needed hands-on educational experiences and generate millions of smiles for West Virginia’s youth.  To learn more about gift options, click here.

Make a gift with your credit card now by clicking here  or learn about naming opportunities and more by contacting Judith L. Wellington, Ph.D., Clay Center President and Chief Executive Officer at (304) 561-3513 or Kathy Bush-Morris, Chief Development Officer at (304) 561-3588 or kbush@theclaycenter.org. 

The Center’s endowment fundraising efforts are led by Lloyd Jackson, former West Virginia senator from Lincoln County, with the support of many dedicated community members.