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Community Development And Participation

Southern Ohio Museum and Cultural Center, Portsmouth

Nominated By: Scioto Foundation

View video tribute (2:24 minutes, 8.5M)

For more than 26 years, the Southern Ohio Museum and Cultural Center (SOMAC) has responded to the needs of the Portsmouth and Scioto County area, providing arts education and cultural enrichment to thousands of children and adults. The Museum has secured Ohio Arts Council artist residencies each year since 1979 and provided guided tours of exhibitions that serve as catalysts for arts education, writing and critical thinking. The Museum has a custom-craft-ed, alternative educational opportunity that enables interactive arts education for students in the city schools’ Center for Alternative and Progressive Education(CAPE), including discussion of exhibitions, a hands-on studio project, and a writing exercise related directly to the exhibition. SOMAC supports local minority communities, developing interests and arts opportunities both in-house and off-site. Through a close collaboration with the OAC’s Community Development Initiative (CDI) the Museum developed a Youth Summit which pinpointed a dearth of local activities for children. They subsequently launched Cirque d’ Art Theatre, a performing arts troupe. Of 200weekly participants, 137 are considered ''at risk'' and 20 or more have multiple disabilities. Involvement in the CDI project, the Cirque program and the opening of the new permanent exhibition of 10,000prehistoric Native American artifacts has dramatically raised the profile of the Museum in the community and region, and has had a direct impact on tourism, economic development and increased audience participation. Through their innovative programming and thoughtful community engagement SOMAC has helped Portsmouth and the surrounding region develop a renewed sense of connection to the arts.