MetLife Foundation and the National Guild have announced the grant recipients of the 2012 MetLife Foundation Creative Aging Program. Technical assistance and grants totaling more than $90,000 have been awarded to nine nonprofit arts education organizations that will deepen and expand professionally-led arts education programs for older adults. Each of the grantees has demonstrated the capacity to develop programs that can increase participants’ social engagement as well as mastery of one or more art forms.  

Grants were awarded to the following National Guild member organizations:

• Artists Collective, Hartford, CT (Music & Storytelling)
   
• Brooklyn-Queens Conservatory of Music, Brooklyn, NY (Music)*
   
• Community Music Center, San Francisco, CA (Music)*
   
• Creative Center at University Settlement, New York, NY (Theater & Visual Arts)
   
• Elders Share the Arts, Brooklyn, NY (Visual Arts & Writing)*
   
• Encore Creativity for Older Adults, Washington, DC (Music)
   
• MacPhail Center for Music, Minneapolis, MN (Music)
   
• Marcia P. Hoffman Performing Arts Institute, Clearwater, FL (Music & Writing)*
   
• McGroarty Arts Center, Tujunga, CA (Visual Arts)

*Returning grantees

Click here for a description of each program

Download full press release (PDF)

The National Endowment for the Arts’ Creativity and Aging Study shows that professionally-led arts education programs can have extremely positive effects on the general and mental health of older adults. Older adults who participated in programs supported by the MetLife Foundation Creative Aging Program in 2009 experienced a statistically significant improvement in their moods, reinforcing the findings in the National Endowment for the Arts study. A report (PDF) detailing the results of the Creative Aging Program is available online.

"MetLife Foundation is committed to making quality arts programs accessible to people of all ages," stated Dennis White, president and CEO of MetLife Foundation. "As we embark on our fourth year of supporting and expanding the Creative Aging Program, we are pleased with its success and positive impact on the lives of older Americans.”

"Through the MetLife Foundation Creative Aging Program, we will continue to enhance our members' capacity to develop, evaluate and sustain successful creative aging programs, and share what they learn with the field," said Jonathan Herman, executive director of the National Guild.