2024
Diversity & Socioeconomic Impact Report
Introduction
Video message from CEO | CFO/COO
Methodology
All data from this report comes from self-reported data from participants and staff of Bluecoats programming. Students auditioning for the drum corps were given a survey as a part of the registration process, participants of our 2024 drum corps were given a survey to fill out during the contracting and onbaording process, students attending The Blue Way Summer Arts camp were given a survey as a part of the registration process, and staff were given a survey as part of the season onboarding process. All surveys collect voluntary data, and where possible, there is a “prefer not to say” option, or an “other” option, where respondents can type in a different response. While much of our data collection in 2024 remained the same as in 2023, some questions posed and response offerings changed. As we continue to learn and grow in our approach to collecting and reporting data for this report, our data collection will evolve as well.
Executive Summary
At Bluecoats, we seek to increase and intensify efforts to ensure equitable access for and participation by people from all racial, ethnic, socio-economic backgrounds, genders, and LGBTQ+ identities. We also seek to actively encourage and facilitate such participation.
In addition, we seek to form a staff and board of directors reflecting a diverse array of backgrounds and that serves all of our constituents. A first step in this process is to collect the raw data from the students and staff we work with in order to set a baseline for future development. This project started in 2020 with our first Diversity & Socioeconomic Impact Annual Report. In our fifth year of creating this report, we have collected more data from participants of our programming than ever before, and we continue to develop both our collection and presentation of these data.
In addition to the reported data, you are also invited to browse a summary of the current initiatives in place, and why we feel these measures are important goals for the organization’s efforts to advance a more inclusive culture. We hope you will agree that these initiatives and programs are valuable. Likewise, we hope that you will be inspired to join with us and work to make the Bluecoats Community a leader in the performing arts space.
Meet the Diversity & Inclusion Advisory Council
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Rand Clayton
they/them
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Dan Coleman
he/him
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Genevieve Geisler, CFO/COO
she/her
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Irene Guggenheim-Triana
she/they
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Justin Johnson
he/him
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JohnDavid Mayo
he/him
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Kate McIlvain, Council Chair
she/her
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Susie O'Brien
she/her
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Mike Scott, CEO
he/him
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Lisa Smith
she/her
Programs
At Bluecoats, we create programs that enrich the lives of young people and celebrate the joys that art and the performing arts bring to the Bluecoats Community. As we reflect on our progress in bringing this mission to life, we must also reflect on how well we bring these life-enriching programs to everyone, and how inclusive this “Bluecoats Community” really is.
We believe that we must start any assessment of the efficacy of our programming by first analyzing who our programs reach, and how inclusive we are as an organization as we seek to expand that reach.
While the Bluecoats Drum & Bugle Corps is our most notable and recognizable program, the Bluecoats organization operates several programs. Our ensemble programs include the Bluecoats Drum & Bugle Corps, Rhythm IN BLUE, and alumni-focused programs like Legacy Arc.
Additionally, we operate several learning programs like The Blue Way Summer Arts, the Bluecoats Fellowship, Bluecoats School of the Arts, Learning Access, our school group ticketing program, and an affiliation with a local agency called En-Rich-Ment, which operates free after school and weekend programming for under-resourced youth.
Below, you can see the 2024 report on demographic and socio-economic impact for Audition Experience Camps, Bluecoats Drum and Bugle Corps, and The Blue Way Summer Arts Camp.
The Bluecoats Drum & Bugle Corps
The Bluecoats Audition Experience Events
Every year, hundreds of students from around the world join us in-person for Audition Experience Events and online for Virtual Auditions. Students get the opportunity to audition for the Bluecoats, learn from our world-class educational team, and to get the Bluecoats Experience for a weekend.
During the event registration process, we collected data from 977 total auditionees - 173 virtual and 804 in-person.
Race & Ethnicity
How would you describe yourself?
Gender Identity
What is your gender identity?
Annual Household Income
Approximately, what is the annual income of your household, including your parents/guardians, unless they do not support you financially in any way?
The Bluecoats Drum & Bugle Corps Participants
Founded in 1972, the drum corps is the face of the Bluecoats organization, and the primary program through which we bring life-changing performing arts experiences to youth, and host world-class performing arts events for our communities. Bluecoats serves young adults from around the world between the ages of 16 & 22.
During the participant onboarding process, we collected data from 100% of the 165 drum corps participants.
Race & Ethnicity
How would you describe yourself?
Gender Identity
What is your gender identity?
Annual Household Income
Approximately, what is the annual income of your household, including your parents/guardians, unless they do not support you financially in any way?
The Blue Way Summer Arts Camp
At The Blue Way Summer Arts Camp, attendees rehearse alongside the Bluecoats for a Spring Training weekend and perform at the Bluecoats Opening Night Community Celebration.
During the event registration process, we collected data from 100% of 239 students registered for The Blue Way Summer Arts Camp. This includes students registered for the residential and commuter options, and the one-day pro-audio clinic.Blue Way Summer Arts Camp.
Race & Ethnicity
How would you describe yourself?
Gender Identity
What is your gender identity?
Annual Household Income
Approximately, what is the annual income of your household, including your parents/guardians, unless they do not support you financially in any way?
Our Team
Our pursuit of a more equitable and inclusive community at Bluecoats requires that we work towards inclusivity and equity among both our participants and our staff.
For the 2024 programming year, we incorporated survey questions directly into the staff onboarding process. This helped us ensure a higher response rate than in previous years.
Race & Ethnicity
How would you describe yourself?
Gender Identity
What is your gender identity?
Diversity & Inclusion Initiatives
This report, and the data in it, is a vital step to analyzing our progress toward a more anti-racist, inclusive, and equitable organization. In addition to these data, we feel that an important part of this report is to publish a summary of our work toward this vision. In 2024, we worked on the following projects.
En-Rich-Ment Arts Education Center
In 2024, Bluecoats and EN-RICH-MENT opened the En-Rich-Ment Arts Education Center in Downtown Canton, a space dedicated to the educational programs of EN-RICH-MENT. The building occupies the space of the former Ziegler Tire building at Market Ave & 9th St and was renovated and expanded to include music and dance rehearsal spaces, classrooms and practice rooms, a professional kitchen, and offices and administrative space for EN-RICH-MENT.
Founded in 2012 by Betty Smith, EN-RICH-MENT provides free music and arts education to any student that signs up. Known throughout Stark County for its drumline, the organization also features dance, theater, color guard, music, and art programs - as well as important leadership and life skills classes, including cooking, gardening and nutrition. The program predominantly serves Black and Brown students and reaches 400+ students from under-resourced communities each year.
Online Hiring & Open Applications
In late 2019, we launched bluecoats.com/jobs and made available open, standing applications for roles including operations, education, and design. Later in 2020, an open application was made available for Director At Large positions for the board of directors, the highest level of governance within the Bluecoats organization. Through our experiences in hiring, and from conversations led by the Diversity & Inclusion Advisory Council, we have learned how hiring within the drum corps community is often done from within the pre-existing networks of those already on educational and design teams. Oftentimes, these networks stem from the contacts that a senior leader, like a caption head or designer, has created over their career. These pre-existing networks are, by nature, exclusionary, and they reduce the ability for those outside of such networks to gain access to work opportunities within the drum corps community.
By creating open and standing job postings, even when there are no immediate openings, we are introducing a gateway for individuals not already within such networks, to apply for roles at Bluecoats. We hope that this not only aids our efforts to diversify our team, but also brings new ideas to the table and continues to improve the world-class programming and operations Bluecoats takes such pride in.
Anti-Racism Policy & Ban On Hate Groups
A principle philosophy of anti-racism leadership is that action, in the form of policy, can elicit change and modify structures where systemic racism has made an impact. Through the fruitful collaboration of the Diversity & Inclusion Advisory Council, the executive team, and the Policy Task Force of the Board of Directors, in 2021 we announced the adoption of a new Anti-Racism Policy. Among other things, this policy bans affiliation with or solidarity of hate groups, as defined by the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Hate Map (TM). Furthermore, it prohibits the display of hate symbols, including the Confederate Battle Flag, as listed in the Hate On Display (TM) database compiled by the Anti Defamation League.
This policy enshrines many of the initiatives outlined in this report, and others, as active steps towards advancing anti-racism within the entire Bluecoats Community. You can read more about the policy and its directives here.
Bluecoats School of the Arts
In September 2020, Bluecoats launched a brand new program: Bluecoats School of the Arts. This online school - built by Bluecoats - brings all of this organization’s educational programming online through live educational events, on-demand coursework, and even private lessons.
While School of the Arts is not fundamentally an initiative aimed at diversity, equity, and inclusion - it does represent a new future for Bluecoats programming that is inherently more accessible and catered to a broader variety of students and skills. From the start, our vision for School of the Arts was a program that removed barriers to entry for Bluecoats educational programming.
More than 3,000 students have signed up for an account at bluecoats.school, and hundreds of students attended our live learning events like Symposium I, Symposium II, and a series of one-day Institutes catered to specific instruments. Through School of the Arts technology we were able to bring Grammy award winning artists like Jacob Collier, Sput Searight, and Jens Lindemann to students around the globe.
Furthermore, we’ve worked to get the details right, like ensuring that live and on-demand content is captioned, and the website uses ADA accessibility tools for easier access by those who need it.
Play It Forward
For generations, young people have been inspired by the spectacle of their very first drum corps show. This pivotal moment introduced thousands of young people to the arts, and inspired thousands more to build careers in the arts and arts education. Play It Forward aims to bring that life-changing experience to more young people by providing free tickets to middle and high school students in Northeast Ohio.
Each year hundreds of middle school and high school students from our local community get to experience the spectacle of drum corps for the first time thanks to Play It Forward. These students get to see first hand what dedication to excellence, hard work, and artistry can do. And they take part in a time-honored American tradition of drum & bugle corps too!
Play It Forward tickets are distributed based on annual availability. Schools and local music education programs are invited to apply by the Bluecoats team. Programs are required to bring adequate supervision and are encouraged to wear matching t-shirts to represent their program.
Frank Pasquerella Memorial Scholarship Fund
At the end of 2020, Bluecoats worked closely with the family of the late Frank Pasquerella to establish an endowed scholarship fund in his honor. Frank was a Bluecoats alumnus and was notably the original Autumn Leaves trumpet soloist. The song would go on to become the Bluecoats corps song, and the solo spot a coveted honor for Bluecoats trumpet players. Frank was a hugely popular band director in his career and left an impact on hundreds of students.
Since its launch, The Frank Pasquerella Memorial Scholarship Fund has raised more than $25,000, which includes a very generous leadership gift from Maria Pasquerella, Frank’s wife. The funds are housed within the Bluecoats Endowment and are designated to support students attending Bluecoats educational programming such as THE BLUE WAY Summer Educational Experience, Bluecoats School of the Arts, and other events.
Conclusion
Conclusion statement from DIAC.