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Business Skills for the Creative Arts Economy  The Creative Arts Enterprise Program at Arkansas State University-Beebe began in 2006 after Arkansas arts and economic leaders met to discuss the enormous potential for creative arts industry in the Natural State. Those leaders also recognized that professional, self-employed artists,artisans, and craftspeople needed more than their creative talents. They need the marketing skills to connect with their customers within a specialized creative economy, and they need the business management skills to make their creative business ventures thrive. So, ASU-Beebe developed a program, the first of its kind in the state, to deliver precisely those skills, tailored to the needs of the creative arts professional through both Associate’s Degrees and Technical Certificates.
In ASU-Beebe’s Creative Arts Enterprise Program, practicing artists, artisans and crafts persons may present portfolios of existing works to receive credit for some or all of the art courses required. Students without an existing portfolio of work enroll in courses to help them produce one, choosing among studio art classes, design, welding, auto body, or any offered course in which the students can practice elements of their craft. All students complete a curriculum of core courses in general education and business, followed by a capstone course in which students showcase their creative work and their business skills by putting on a gallery show. ASU-Beebe currently is developing an e-commerce curriculum that will allow artists and artisans to use the Internet to market their products globally. This may prove to be an ideal vehicle for many of Arkansas’ rural artists. Students also will be able to complete the program via distance learning offered though the college’s well-established online programs. For more information, please contact Dr. Dennis Humphrey at
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or Robert Mitchum at
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. You also may visit the ASU-Beebe website: AAS in Creative Arts Enterprise: http://advising.asub.edu/advising/checklists/degree_AAS/AAS_CreativeArts.htm. Technical Certificate in Creative Arts Enterprise: http://advising.asub.edu/advising/checklists/cert_TECH/TECH_CreatArtsEnt.htm. |
