California Arts Council support will strengthen Youth in Arts’ Intensive Arts Mentorship (I AM) paid arts mentorship program for teens, advancing our commitment to creative youth development and equity. CAC funds will directly support mentorship activities, public art creation and installation, teaching artist fees, and stipends for teen participants—underscoring our belief that young people deserve to be paid for their creative contributions to community. The Arts and Youth grant will help empower marginalized youth in Marin County by providing access to high-quality arts education, valuable creative job skills, and leadership opportunities, while promoting economic and community development, and offering a platform to amplify youth voice, through public art.
For 50 years, Youth in Arts has developed visual and performing arts skills in young people through innovative and meaningful programs that foster confidence, compassion and resilience in students of all abilities. Through direct education, intentional teacher/educator support, and meaningful advocacy, Youth in Arts changes the lives of thousands in and around San Francisco’s north bay as well as insisting that access to a creative life is a right for all students.Through residencies, performances, community events, and intensive mentorship programs , we help young people develop specific art skills and provide opportunities for them to share their work. We maintain a roster of Mentor Artists that is both artistically and culturally diverse, and are dedicated to the principle of “reaching all learners,” differentiating and tailor designing programs for students of diverse backgrounds and students of all abilities. Through our Arts Unite Us residencies, we are the only consistent provider of arts for special education classrooms in Marin County. Other core programs include an extensive in-school residency program, assembly and workshops programs from a culturally relevant pedagogical lens, `Til Dawn A Cappella our teen mentorship, the YIArts.COR is our creative online resource for virtual and digital learning, and the YIA Gallery, one of only a handful of galleries in the country dedicated to showcasing youth art.

