Accessibility in the Arts Workshops Available Across the State VSA Minnesota, the statewide organization whose mission is to create a community where people with disabilities can learn through, participate in and access the arts will be closing its doors at the end of September.  This will mean that the “one-stop shop for arts access” for which the organization has been known will no longer be around.  Therefore, over the next nine weeks, Craig Dunn, the Execuitve Director of VSA, will be in five communities to do a final “brain download” of arts access and disability awareness information as a service to the state arts community.  He will be in the following five locations from 1:00 to 4:00 p.m. on the following dates: Wednesday, July 17 Gremlin Theatre, Annex Building, Vandalia Crossing, 550 Vandalia Street, St. Paul  55114 Tuesday, July 30 St. Cloud Central Library, Bremer Community Room 104, 1300 W St Germain Street, St. Cloud 56301 Wednesday, July 31 Rochester Civic Music, Rochester Government Center, Conf. Rm. 104, 201 4th Street SE,  Rochester  55904-3778 Tuesday, August 13 Historic Holmes Theatre, 806 Summit Avenue, Detroit Lakes  56501 Tuesday, August 20 Reif Arts Center, 720 NW Conifer Drive, Grand Rapids  55744 The workshops will be designed to share accessibility and disability information that has been collected, compiled and developed by VSA Minnesota staff over the past 33 years and to answer questions about audience accommodations, disability etiquette and emerging trends in the field of arts access.  Electronic resource lists, internet links and suggestions of people to contact will be made available to all attendees at the three-hour gatherings.  They will also provide light refreshments at each location. The target audience is arts administrators, board members and any others interested in access to the arts for people with disabilities.  There is no charge to attend but, so that they know how many might attend and so that they can meet the various communication needs of participants, they will ask that people provide them with the responses to the following three questions:
  1. What is your name & what organization(s) do you work/volunteer with?
  2. Which workshop will you be attending (St. Paul, St. Cloud, Rochester, Detroit Lakes, Grand Rapids)?
  3. Does your participation require an ASL interpreter, a deaf/blind interpreter, or Real-time captioning (CART)?
These workshops are supported by a services grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board to assist them in transferring their organizational knowledge to the Minnesota arts community. Should you have any questions about these presentations, email or call Craig Dunn at the numbers below. Craig J. Dunn Executive Director VSA Minnesota 528 Hennepin Av  Suite 305 Minneapolis, MN   55403 612-332-3888 www.vsamn.org