Students in Clatsop County will have a new opportunity to develop their artistic talents next school year.

The Sitka Center for Art and Ecology, based in Otis, announced an expansion of its youth art program. The Sitka Center oversees monthly art workshops in schools in Tillamook and Lincoln counties. Starting next fall, it will bring professional art instructors to all five school districts in Clatsop County.

The youth program launched in two Tillamook County elementary schools in 2020. The program aims to fill gaps in arts access in rural parts of the state, where schools may not have the funding to sustain comprehensive arts programs.

Over the past few years, the program has continued to expand. During the most recent school year, the Sitka Center served about 2,000 students, with the addition of a pilot program in Lincoln County.

Now, with the expansion of programming into Clatsop County, the Sitka Center’s programming will reach approximately 5,000 students across three counties.

“This is a pilot program,” Alison Dennis, the Sitka Center’s executive director, said. “We’re still in the early stages, and learning what works best, really trying to design and hone the program to meet the needs of rural schools and close any barriers, specific challenges to providing arts access.”

The Sitka Center sends art instructors — typically practicing artists living in the same community as the school — to host seven workshops a year for students ranging from prekindergarten to eighth grade. The curriculum is standardized, but typically incorporates elements unique to the region.

“A really unique feature of the program is that the program is delivered by art instructors who live and are based in the communities that they’re serving,” Dennis said. “And so in that way, individual community-based teachers are able to bring their insights about how to make each lesson especially meaningful for the particular school, the particular class, the particular student body that they’re serving.”

The Sitka Center’s youth program is funded through a combination of private donations and a Youth Promise grant through the state’s youth development program. The cost for the Sitka Center to host a youth program in one school is about $26,000, but the school pays just $4,000 for the year.

Dennis emphasized that while school districts must chip in, paying for Sitka’s programming is substantially more affordable than hiring a full-time art teacher.

“The estimated cost for a school to staff a full-time art teacher is something like $90,000 to $100,000 a year, and that’s not including supplies, that’s just the staff,” Dennis said. “So for $4,000, versus $100,000, we’re reaching every kid in the school with seven really high quality, memorable art and STEAM-inspired experiences, just really removing the cost barrier.”

STEAM stands for science, technology, engineering, arts and math.

In the Knappa School District, superintendent Bill Fritz said that art instruction for elementary school students is teacher-led. Bringing in practicing artists with specific expertise — as well as supplies, which the Sitka Center provides — is a substantial shift.

Knappa is paying for the Sitka Center program with the help of a donation from Hampton Lumber, one of the top employers in the region. With that funding, the school district also plans to partner with the Astoria Arts and Movement Center to offer monthly dance workshops for students in sixth-through-12th grade.

“We’ve got a drama program. We’ve got music. We’ve got pretty strong visual arts at the secondary level right now,” Fritz said. “So this kind of finishes the package.”

Kristin Rasmussen, the director of public affairs and communications for Hampton Lumber, recognized that access to arts programming can be limited in rural areas. “We believe investments in arts-related programs and initiatives help create more vibrant communities and a stronger, more creative workforce,” she said in a statement.

In its first year in Clatsop County, Dennis explained that the Sitka Center hopes to create an accessible art experience that both educators and students look forward to — and one that hopefully installs a love for art in the younger generations.

“It’s exciting to imagine what will be possible in the creative lives of these kids and these communities with robust arts programming reaching every kid in school,” Dennis said.