We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful AnnMarie Halterman. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with AnnMarie below.

Alright, AnnMarie thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. How’s you first get into your field – what was your first job in this field?

Well, how I got my first job in the arts world is a bit unusual. The NEA (which I learned after my first encounter with the chairwoman) stands for National Endowment for the Arts. As a federal program, the NEA was in need of a strategic plan for a new program. As it happened, the NEA leadership came across a strategic plan I had volunteered to write for a nonprofit.

A friend asked me if I’d be willing to talk to the NEA leadership as they wanted to discuss my process to create and implement strategic plans. Being the nerdy geek that I am, I was totally excited to talk to the NEA leaders about organizational design.

When it became apparent that they were offering me a job, I only had one question for the team…was I required to be able to identify important people and/or remember people’s names. I’m horrible with names and even more clueless about who is famous or we’ll known. I took the job and really enjoyed my first experience with creating a Healing arts program!

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

My name is AnnMarie Halterman and I’m the Co-Founder and Executive Director of UNITING US (UNITINGUS.ORG). Prior to starting UNITING US, I worked as the strategic developer, lead implementer, and capacity director for the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) Creative Forces program. Prior to working as a Senior Advisor to the NEA, my military and civilian transition work was related to engineering.

In 2020, my family and I founded UNITING US, a nonprofit arts organization to inspire, empower, and unite veterans, military, and their families with the communities in which they live through art. Highly respected research institutions like Stanford and Harvard have proven that being a part of arts activities provides a calming experience that leads to trauma healing and shapes long term well-being and enhanced community engagement.

The UNITING US Integrative Art Activities program is designed to make arts accessible for all people with beginner, crafter, hobby artist, and professionals given the opportunity to be involved and/or continue to be involved in arts activities. The three-stage program invites participants to be part of art making workshops, exhibit/perform in distinguished public locations, and assist in leading UNITING US sponsored national art festivals for the public to introduce the healing and uniting benefits of community art programs.

In addition to providing engagement opportunities for individuals, families, and communities, UNITING US creates an environment where participants can develop their narrative, share their story, and contribute to the local community. Unlike nonprofit arts organizations that focus on art making experiences, UNITING US provides an outlet for participants to share their stores through exhibition and engagements in the communities they live in highly respected locations nationwide.

Some of our most proud achievements are the creation of the first ever National Art Galleries and International Art Galleries at the Metropolitan Washington Airports where we have featured more than 300 UNITING US artists over the past 3 years. Additionally, our programs have taken place at elite professional galleries and community locations such as the Arlington National Cemetary, Martin L King Jr Library, Military Women’s Memorial, British Embassy, and the Library of Congress (where 12,000 visitors) to celebrated our artist showcase event.

Can you tell us about what’s worked well for you in terms of growing your clientele?

In the three years we have been operating, we rely on three different strategies for growing our clientele. First, given our military community participant profile, word of mouth through program ambassadors, other nonprofit VSOs, and the personal and professional networks of Uniting US participants has been our number one recruiting process. As our community grew in size, our social media and web presence became another avenue to attract people interested in our mission and programming. The third strategy emerged as we executed our program with partner organizations. In the planning, executing, and close-out process, we found that many of the stakeholders and leaders of our partner’s team really appreciated what we bring to the community. In addition to our programming impact, the dedication and genuine nature of our volunteers and participants creates long term meaningful friendships.

Our clientele numbers continue to increase as our program design tiers allow individuals to participate in many different aspects of our mission enabling a high retention rate.

Other than training/knowledge, what do you think is most helpful for succeeding in your field?

Prior to starting UNITING US, the knowledge and training base that I possessed was always the key to establishing a solid reputation. However, in the nonprofit sector, I think the most helpful quality for success is my passion and energy that I feel about the value of therapeutic arts. As a grass roots initiative, my personal experience is what fuels my drive and has an added benefit when connecting to the program participants.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://unitingus.org/
• Instagram: uniting_us
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/uniting.us.5/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/annmarie-halterman-b0b6063/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/uniting_us
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCoOfjS3FrteFMuhglx3bNLQ