We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Donna Guzzo. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Donna below.
Donna, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today We’d love to hear about a project that you’ve worked on that’s meant a lot to you.
Raising funds to have a home for the First Coast Cultural Center. The center’s mission is to bring the arts into the life of the community though exhibits, programs and outreach; and by honoring a donor-driven philosophy.
We currently put on 172 programs per year, host 5 -6 pop-up exhibits per year and host an annual signature event, Beaches, A Celebration of the Arts where we recognize others in our community.
Some of the programing take place at 13 local schools in St. Johns County. We meet after school for 90 min. of arts enrichment at 7 schools.
We also offer our outreach, a music therapy program for children with disabilities at 6 schools during daytime school hours. We currently serve 3 Tile I schools with the music therapy program, and 1 Title I school with the after-school enrichment.
We find it very valuable for everyone to have access to the arts. This is vital to a vibrant community!
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 background is in Finance and Fundraising. As CEO I develop others to be the best at their craft, to be cross-trained, to grow and continue to have professional development. I listen to my staff or artists members to continue to improve the Center. I believe people need to connect to then engage and have “the experience.”
As a number’s person, I run the day-to-day operations of the Cultural Center. I run the current capital campaign that just kicked off on March 16, 2023, for an 18-month period. We need to raise $6.3M!!
I believe in my motto: Success is imminent!
Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?
When COVID hit the First Coast Cultural Center took a financial hit like many other small nonprofits. Even though we were on lockdown for 4 months, we did not sit idle. We innovated the after-school enrichment program by living our mission of bringing the arts into the life of our community. We went from offering art at 1 school in 2020 to 4 in 2021 to 7 in 2023.
In your view, what can society to do to best support artists, creatives and a thriving creative ecosystem?
Read. Learn. Connect. Engage. Experience. The First Coast Cultural Center is a place for everyone to experience, appreciate and better understand the arts. We need to start with children. Take children to museums. Have children perform in theater. Give children the experience so they can appreciate the arts.
Contact Info:
- Website: firstcoastculturalcenter.org
- Instagram: firstcoastcc_
- Facebook: First Coast Cultural Center
- Linkedin: Donna Guzzo
- Youtube: https://youtu.be/d6PwC3gJVZ8