First Person: Mobilizing Creativity with The Arts Bus

When executive director Genny Albert invited me to accompany The Arts Bus to Sharon Elementary School, she advised me to simply look for a bus as I exited I-89. And while I certainly was quickly greeted by the distinctive Arts Bus with its signature colorful siding, I was not expecting how Albert and her team were able to truly transform the schoolyard of Sharon Elementary into a creative wonderland.

I was met with a landscape of spouting water fountains, bubbles, a fog machine, and even a snow cone station, sights that excited my inner child. It quickly became clear that The Arts Bus is more than a traveling art studio, it is a practice in childhood imagination. After a conversation with Albert, I learned that change in routine and environment is a significant part of the organization's dogma.

"If we were trying to teach in a cafeteria or a gym or a library, it's not the same," says Albert. "A child that's in an afterschool program and a school and a summer camp might spend 40 weeks a year in that school, 10 hours a day. If we can take the kids and we can put them in a whole new space and for a moment change it all up, have them sit at different places and also not have the academic rigor or standard, it's empowerment. It does all of a sudden unlock something. When we come with the bus, there's this whole different kind of engagement. You're taking them out of the norm."

Since its launch in 2008, The Arts Bus has been committed to its mission of making arts education accessible to the youth of Vermont, quite literally bringing the arts classroom to them. The bus is now able to reach more than 1,500 children yearly, making more than 150 stops in over 20 Vermont communities.

The Arts Bus is a current recipient of the Arts Council's three-year Arts Operating Grant. Albert told me that this financial support helps the organization pay artists a fair wage, as well as help make the bus accessible to all.

"[The Arts Council] helps us keep our programs free for the kids to enter, which means there's never a charge at the door," stated Albert. "What that also does is it removes any of the financial stigma of 'can you afford to go on the bus or can't you?' I'm so grateful for it because then we are bridging opportunity gaps. You don't have to go get one-on-one private lessons to learn how to do this art thing."

I boarded The Arts Bus in Sharon during its week-long stop at the One Planetsummer day camp program held at the elementary school. The week's theme focused on studying water in all forms. On Monday, campers drew bubbles on magnetic canvases using watercolor pencils and alcohol-based blending markers. On Tuesday, they ice-dyed bucket hats, and on Wednesday, they used watercolors and fan brushes to emulate the flow of water. The Arts Bus is able to seamlessly integrate hands-on learning with creative fun.

Albert spoke about the connection between creativity and science. "We do a STEAM [Science-Technology-Engineering-Art-Math] program every summer because I am a gearhead and a math person. I want to really, really emphasize how much art is a part of STEM. It should not just be STEM, art is even in all the STEM programming, even if they don't acknowledge it," she said.

Following a career in pension fund advisory, Albert became the executive director of The Arts Bus in 2019. After a more analytical career, she was looking to work in the nonprofit realm and with young people, guided by her philosophy that "how you impact the future is you work with children, they are the future."

A week of art and learning was punctuated by Friday's culminating event: an afternoon of water-themed festivities with an educational foundation. The Arts Bus collaborated with professional ice sculptor Tony Perham, who provided campers with an informative tutorial that featured ice lanterns, frozen orbs, and even a (professionally handled) chainsaw demonstration. I was impressed by Perham and The Arts Bus's ability to hold campers' attention on a hot summer day, especially with a snow cone station and kiddie pools in close proximity. But just as Albert describes, The Arts Bus is not a traditional education environment: ice slush was flung, jokes were made, and kids were invited to be kids. It is this kind of environment that best opens children to learning and curiosity.

Perham's ice sculpture tutorial was followed by an afternoon of icy dessert, bubble making, water fights, and a general motif of joy. Groups of campers were able to board the bus, which had, of course, been subjected to an alien invasion (hence the fog machine). The interior of the vehicle had been transformed into a black light wonderland where children could see their bucket hats glow and view an "out of this world" ice sculpture created by Perham.

This excursion to Sharon Elementary School is part of The Arts Bus's "Ever After Kids" program, which received the Vermont Children's Trust Foundation's Lynne von Trapp Awardin 2021. The Art Bus's website states that "the program is based on acceptance of two systemic facts: 1) there will forever be children in after care programs; and 2) quality art education will always be limited in school budgets." The "Ever After Kids" program is able to bring art education to over 500 children in 17 different schools during the school year and travel to eight to ten different summer camps.

"Ever After Kids" is one of five programs offered by The Arts Bus, as the organization works to reach children of all different age groups in settings ranging from daycares to homeschooling environments to large community events. Albert describes that this scope allows The Arts Bus "to respond to the needs of the community with variety."

When asked about the future of The Arts Bus, Albert hopes for an even more accessible Arts Bus empire, with more buses capable of reaching even more of Vermont's youth to spread the power of creativity.

"Imagination and innovation, problem-solving, risk-taking, social-emotional learning, sharing concepts, all of these things are a part of art," says Albert. "I tell the kids all the time, I want my next bus to be a hover bus because you can create it. It's your generation that needs to come up with this, but I'm here to do fun things with you to kind of start getting those juices flowing, so that you're not afraid to take risks, so that you're not afraid to try new things."

You can contact or give to The Arts Bus on its website.