Welcome to the New a2ru.org!

Aug 1, 2021

Welcome to the new a2ru.org!

We first began our redesign process for this site in late 2019; since then, of course, much has changed. The communities we serve in the arts and higher education have felt especially strongly the historic impact of the COVID pandemic, which has kept us apart and out of our classrooms, studios, and concert halls, as well as the racial reckoning in the United States prompted by the murder of George Floyd and violent discrimination against Asian Americans.

As we moved through what became a completely remote design process, the a2ru team felt strongly that we wanted this site to feel like a gathering place: an online space where we could connect more deeply with the like-minded scholars, artists, students, and leaders who make our work possible. A place to find information, inspiration, and conversation with an ever-growing international community.

Here are some of the major changes you’ll find on the site:

• We’ve redesigned our homepage so you can see, at a glance, the latest news, events, research, and job postings from a2ru and around the network.
• We’re introducing the Creative Placemaking Resource Hub, which builds upon the ArtPlace America archives and will continue to gather resources for creative placemaking in higher education and beyond.
• We have expanded our member profiles for our institutional members to more dynamically capture the unique arts ecologies on each campus.
• Our blog posts have commenting enabled to encourage dialogue.
• Some of our content has become member-exclusive, particularly from our research and event archives.
• We’ve upgraded our navigation and search functionality to make it easier to find what you’re looking for.

We are also thrilled to be launching a new membership model alongside the new site. Like the website redesign, this new model has been in the works since before COVID-19, but the pandemic convinced us that we needed a membership structure that was inclusive, flexible, and accessible. We are opening membership to all higher education institutions–including art schools, liberal arts colleges, and community colleges–as well as academic departments and individuals for the first time. We want to make a2ru membership available to anyone who wants to join us. We hope you’ll encourage your colleagues and friends to consider becoming a member.

We want to say a special thank you to our web development and design team at Phire Group for their diligent and inspired work on this site, and to the team at ArtPlace America for their generous financial support, which has made both the Creative Placemaking Resource Hub and the a2ru.org site redesign possible.

Finally, this site will continue to evolve and change to meet the needs of our network; please don’t hesitate to contact us with your questions, thoughts and suggestions.

We’re so happy you’re here! We hope you’ll come back often to see what’s new and share what’s happening on your campuses. Thank you for being a part of our community.

Your a2ru team,

Maryrose Flanigan, Executive Director

Shannon Fitzsimons Moen, Associate Director

Veronica Stanich, Research Programs Manager

Charisse Willis, Program Coordinator/Conference Director