Words Beats & Life to Receive $100,000 Grant from the National Endowment for the Arts as part of the American Rescue Plan
DATE: Thursday, January 27, 2022
CONTACT: Alex Mitchell PR@wblinc.org
Washington, DC—Words Beats & Life is pleased to announce they have been approved to receive an American Rescue Plan grant from the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) to help the arts and cultural sector recover from the pandemic. Words Beats & Life is recommended to receive $ 100,000 and may use this funding to save jobs and to fund operations and facilities, health and safety supplies, and marketing and promotional efforts to encourage attendance and participation. In total, the NEA will award grants totaling $57,750,000 to 567 arts organizations in all 50 states, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and Washington, DC.
“Our nation’s arts sector has been among the hardest hit by the COVID-19 pandemic. The National Endowment for the Arts’ American Rescue Plan funding will help arts organizations, such as Words Beats & Life, rebuild and reopen,” said Dr. Maria Rosario Jackson, chair of the NEA. “The arts are crucial in helping America’s communities heal, unite, and inspire, as well as essential to our nation’s economic recovery.”
"In addition to assisting with staff salaries, this funding from the NEA will allow Words Beats and Life to support its inaugural creative leaders fellowship, Towards 2040, investing directly in individuals from the Hip Hop community that are building solutions for our collective future,” said Asad Ali Jafri, Director of Events. “In the last year alone we have engaged more than 30,000 youth and young adults through in-person and virtual programming designed to educate and inspire. This includes over 3,000 students in Arts Education and Creative Employment programs in schools, libraries and community spaces.”
The American Rescue Plan was signed into law in March 2021 when the NEA was provided $135 million for the arts sector. The funding for organizations is the third installment providing more than $57.7 million for arts organizations. In April 2021, the NEA announced $52 million (40 percent) in ARP funding would be allocated to 62 state, jurisdictional, and regional arts organizations for regranting through their respective programs. The second installment in November 2021 allocated $20.2 million to 66 local arts agencies for subgranting to local artists and art organizations.
For more information on the NEA’s American Rescue Plan grants, including the full list of arts organizations funded in this announcement, visit www.arts.gov/COVID-19/the-american-rescue-plan.
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About Words Beats & Life :We are unapologetic advocates for the transformative power of Hip-Hop culture in all its forms, empowering artists to relentlessly create and refine systems that demonstrate positive change through our individual and collective brilliance. We embrace the sacred nature of our work and our roles as keepers and innovators of our culture.
We create arts based educational experiences that equip youth, arts managers, teaching artists and scholars to move from theory to practice. We harness the power of the imagination to reshape the lives and communities we serve.