Canvas to Career: The Fine Arts Center Turns 50

Celebrating 50 years of excellence, Greenville County Schools Fine Arts Center has generated millions in scholarship offers for its students - yet Director Vee Popat measures success by how each young artist develops as a whole person, whether they become Broadway performers or scientists with creative thinking skills. Step inside this nationally-recognized creative ecosystem where architecture students tackle homelessness solutions and teenagers master professional mindsets alongside their artistic crafts.

Links:

The Fine Arts Center website

The Fine Arts Center's performance calendar/events page

Transcript

Katy Smith:
[0:02] Greenville County Schools, the public school district that serves this county, is the 44th largest school district in the United States and the largest in South Carolina, and a state leader in school choice. One of the many top-notch choices available to high school artists among the district's 77,000 students is the Fine Arts Center. Launched 50 years ago, the Fine Arts Center offers pre-professional arts training to students who apply and are selected on the basis of skill, interest, and commitment to their discipline. 91.5% of these students go on to higher education, and each year the graduating class of Fine Arts Center students gets millions of dollars in scholarship offers. I'm Katy Smith with Greater Good Greenville, and in this episode of Simple Civics Greenville County, I talk with Vee Popat, Director of the Fine Arts Center, about their programs, students, and instructors, and the role of the Fine Arts Center in Greenville County. In the show notes, we'll put links to more information about the Fine Arts Center, as well as an episode we did with two other special centers of Greenville County Schools: Roper Mountain Science Center and the CTE Innovation Center. By the way, the Fine Arts Center's 50th anniversary celebration is Thursday, April 10th at 7 p.m. in the Peace Center Concert Hall. And if you'd like tickets, you can visit the Peace Center's website. Vee, thank you so much for joining us for this episode.

Vee Popat:
[1:22] Thank you so much for having me, Katy. I really appreciate the opportunity.

Katy Smith:
[1:25] Absolutely. Well, I have appreciated every opportunity I have ever had to walk in the Fine Arts Center. It is just a magical place. And since the folks listening can't actually tour the center today, I wonder if you can just start by giving people a little bit of what they would experience were they to walk in the doors of the beautiful Fine Arts Center.

Vee Popat:
[1:44] I'd love to, and I would add that they cannot tour today, but they can call me anytime to arrange for a tour, especially if they have an interest in engaging with our programming in one way or another. So I will reflect back to the first time that I walked in the building, which was after my first round interview, and I flew down for my final round interview for the position of director. And I could not conceptualize of such a space. It's a school, but it looks like a museum. It's just a beautifully designed architectural space, where you can feel the warmth and you can feel the energy and the creativity coming from the walls. And then once you add students into the space, it's mind-blowing. It feels dynamic. It feels warm and also huge at the same time. And our students will tell you they just love coming here because of the feel that they get when they walk in the building.

Katy Smith:
[2:47] I totally agree. It just has this warmth and vibrancy and just specialness to it. So I appreciate your invitation to folks, and they should definitely take you up on it.

Vee Popat:
[2:59] I must add, I have absolutely nothing to do with the design of the building. It is something that I very gratefully have managed to step into. Those of us who didn't build it, and that's most folks, because when it was designed, it was a different director, and it was with the input of all the faculty, as it should be. So those of us who are lucky enough to be around to curate the space, we just feel charged and empowered to maintain that school climate and culture that's very welcoming and open while simultaneously being focused and energized.

Katy Smith:
[3:33] We are lucky to have so much for artistic students in Greenville County, and really the crown jewel is the Fine Arts Center. Can you give listeners an overview of what the Fine Arts Center offers?

Vee Popat:
[3:44] Absolutely. A very comprehensive menu of pre-professional programs, some that you would expect, some that you wouldn't. So I'll go alphabetically because that's what helped me six years ago to remember all of these offerings. So we offer architecture, creative writing, dance, digital filmmaking, six different areas of music, theater performance, theater design and production, and a visual arts program that also encompasses six studios. Within music, we offer percussion, jazz studies, recording arts, strings chamber music, winds chamber music, and voice.

Katy Smith:
[4:26] That's such an incredible menu of offerings, and it's certainly important for those students' artistic development. But why do you think it is important for our district to offer something like the Fine Arts Center?

Vee Popat:
[4:37] 50 years ago, it was started because the breadth and depth of the arts programs in the schools at that time was not what the superintendent at the time wanted. John Maxwell is a great leadership mentor, and he says, you know, great leaders see more and see before. So, lots of wonderful programs at Greenville started in '74. It's amazing how many organizations we share an anniversary with. But this one was started to really increase that breadth and depth. And there's now many strong arts programs at the elementary, middle, and high school level. Arts are fully embraced here. The Fine Arts Center continues to offer it differently so that we're not at competition with our colleagues in the other schools. And I think that's what makes it important. So if a student would want to immerse themselves in visual arts, for example, for a longer period of time, or have access to state-of-the-art studios that would be more at the collegiate level, and or to be taught by a practicing teaching artist, because those do exist in certain high schools, that's why they would want to come here. If a percussionist, as a former band director, percussionists are in the back of the band.

Vee Popat:
[5:55] They're hard to keep entertained when they're playing band music. Well, here's where they can focus on percussion. Chamber strings, where it's duos and trios and quartets and quintets, much more individualized instruction. So I think, to answer your question, it's important, it's essential for the Greenville County Schools to offer it because it gives students a chance to really immerse themselves in the areas that they're interested in and maybe even have a passion for and maybe even want to go on to do it in college or as a professional. It's a wonderful opportunity. I would say coming from New Jersey, where all the arts programs are in the schools, it's a bit of a luxury. And if you look at these kinds of schools across the country, Katy, many times they are located in large countywide school districts, which is why it makes sense that the 44th largest school district in the country has this kind of facility and our career centers and innovation centers, because it's budgetarily possible to support an institution that allows this kind of immersion.

Katy Smith:
[7:00] That's fantastic. So when students come to the Fine Arts Center to do a deep dive in architecture or dance or strings or whatever that might be, do they also participate in the regular South Carolina high school curriculum? And knowing that they do, how do they juggle it? How do you help them juggle it?

Vee Popat:
[7:17] Yes, they have to. Many of our art school brothers and sisters across the country are all-inclusive schools where the academics occur in the morning, say from eight until maybe even one o'clock. And then the arts teachers come in as adjunct teachers and teach art from one anywhere to five. What's very unique about our school is a student can have a choice of the high school they go to. As you know, Greenville County Schools embraces school choice, so they can apply or they can go to their zoned high school, get their academics there, sure, participate in that high school culture with student council and sports there, eat lunch there, and then come to us, or vice versa. So half of our students do that, come to us in the morning and then go to their high school in the afternoon.

Vee Popat:
[8:06] So it's something that they have to do, participating in regular high school. We also do have a handful of homeschool students, a handful of private school, charter school students that come, but the majority are Greenville County School students. The way that they juggle it, and I can speak from personal experience because my twins go to the Fine Arts Center.

Vee Popat:
[8:27] They're taking two academic classes per semester while their friends who are only at the high school are taking four per semester. So my twins are both taking courses online to keep pace. They'll also grab an online class here or there over the summer. So it demands time management. That is a skill that we teach here.

Vee Popat:
[8:49] You could argue that we use the arts as a means to teach professionalism. And so time management, punctuality, being able to handle multiple things, taking care of the items on your agenda are all parts of the education here. And with that, we collaborate very closely with school counseling departments at the high schools. We have a school counselor here who's fabulous, Gloria Collins. And that's what we do to keep things on track. But I will say, just to put a bow on this part of the conversation, it remains to be a challenge. I'm not afraid as a school leader to admit places that are works in progress. And I actually have a wonderful alumna I'm going to reach out to who had offered to create some examples of course tracks where a student can, let's say, target a career path or a course of study at college in the sciences, and what that looks like when they're entering the Fine Arts Center as a freshman, so that they can better understand, okay, these are the steps that I need to take in order to juggle both. Because it definitely involves juggling, something that, as you know, we have to be good at as adults.

Katy Smith:
[10:01] Yes, absolutely. I would just really underscore how much stronger a future college student and professional you are if you can juggle something like being an artist and being a student at the same time. We all know, in my opinion, busy people get more done because you have to go through that rigor of structure, structuring your schedule. But I do think that should you head into a career that's not artistic, having come through teamwork, accountability, all the things that arts provides, you are really sent off on a fabulous path coming from something like the Fine Arts Center.

Vee Popat:
[10:36] Exactly. And when you look at our graduates, the stats over the years show that on average, 70% of the students will continue their area of study in the arts from the Fine Arts Center to college. 30% don't. And we're here to help all of them. We don't pigeonhole students into careers in the arts. We give them a menu of opportunities. We give them solid career advice. And most importantly, what I tell our students who regularly, our faculty believe in this, and the new students are coming in, we tell them, you're here to learn how to be a professional. Where that ends up for you is entirely up to you.

Katy Smith:
[11:16] That's right. While we're on the subject of students after the Fine Arts Center, I'd love to hear you brag a little bit. You all have so many feathers in your cap with student accomplishments and school-wide accomplishments.

Vee Popat:
[11:26] Thank you. That this is a challenge for me. I like to just keep my head down and remain humble. And I will say our internal philosophy is that we're just trying to make this the best possible place for students. And with that, our philosophy on things like arts competitions are that we're focusing on the process. The awards are what they are because art is subjective. So we want to teach students to be prepared. And we also want to teach them to understand what it feels like to have a no, because that is going to happen multiple times in their lives. So the outcomes, though, are wonderful. Our school is equally as proud of the students who end up with fabulous careers in the arts as those who pivot to do something else extraordinary. I have wonderful stories from alumni who are succeeding in the sciences and careers that they didn't train for here or that they pivoted to. And just to kind of say, we're starting this Hall of Fame for our 50th anniversary, and our intention is not to make it just art-centered.

Vee Popat:
[12:32] Because fame can be a scientist who's working on a cure for a disease. It matters not to us. Of course, it's wonderful to have students go on to Juilliard and Berkeley. And right now we have a run of students going to Duke, which is awesome, a school I never could have gotten into. My answer to the question, though, I get a lot of, which alumni are you most proud of? I'm most proud of the students who have done everything they possibly can to reach the potential that they have. So that could be the student who's the first in their family to attend a college. And they started here in the eight o'clock theater class, theater foundations, and worked their way all the way up to advanced theater and got into college. That to me is just as good as the student who gets into my alma mater, the Frost School of Music at University of Miami on a full ride.

Vee Popat:
[13:23] So those are awesome stories. Let me answer your question though, brag. Okay. Last year's Class of 2024 earned over $19.5 million in scholarship offers, and of those offers, over $16.5 million were for students going to art schools. So on a consistent basis, we are well above $12 million annually in scholarship offers for these students, which to me demonstrates the value that they're presenting to these universities. I think that's a pretty good stat to hang our hats on. We've received some community awards with the Leadership in the Arts Award from the Community Foundation this year. Our school has been recognized by the Arts Schools Network, which is the national professional group of schools like us, arts high schools, as an exemplary school. And our architecture program has really done a marvelous job of showcasing their work with trying to provide a solution to homelessness through the Tiny House Project, which has enabled them to receive a community partnership award from the Arts Schools Network and to be part of a grant from Greenville Women Giving, which was awarded to the Greenville Homeless Alliance for the work that we are doing with the GHA and Soteria Foundation. Really trying to take a project for our architecture students and make it into something that provides a profound difference in the lives of our homeless community here in Greenville.

Katy Smith:
[14:49] Outstanding. I would imagine if people were expecting you to rattle off a list of award winners or people on Broadway or famous visual artists, the answer you gave to me shows the depth of heart that you put in every single student. And that is so important, more important, in fact. I know they can go to your website and learn lots of other things that are worthy of bragging about, but really appreciate the leadership and connection with every student that comes in your doors that you and all of your colleagues have.

Vee Popat:
[15:18] Thank you. I think that's the thing that we're most proud of. It's, yes, we could list our alumni. I think all of our alumni would say that when they were here, they were cared for, they were seen, they feel the love and the attention and the guidance that we give through our climate, our culture, and our arts instruction.

Katy Smith:
[15:38] Wonderful. Well, if someone is interested in learning more, like how to apply, how to come see the Arts Center at work, or how to be a supporter, what should they do?

Vee Popat:
[15:46] Well, there's many options. I am proud that we have a website that is quite comprehensive and informative. The reason why I'm saying that is it's been a few years of a work in progress to try and make sure that we had something that was informative, easy to access, beautiful to look at, because it's an art school. It should be a beautifully designed website. So the website is the key. However, we don't mind folks calling and asking questions. We get calls every day about what we do. And even from some folks who have kids in the elementary school who want their students to be here, we're like, okay, there's a few years for that. But here's what happens when they're in eighth grade. So on that website is a performance calendar, which has all of our events. So we like to think, this might be a little boastful, but we like to think we're the best entertainment deal in Greenville because it's $10 to see a concert of students who are, it's just wonderful to watch them perform and grow. We have over 85 performances per year, and I have no problem with this becoming a public performance venue versus just having parents come. So that's one way to do it. We are very active on Instagram. We post a lot and we try and give our social media viewers a really honest glimpse of what it's like to be a student here. So that's a nice way to take a look. Something that's unique about our school compared to other art schools is you can start here anytime within your high school career. You can be a first-time senior

Vee Popat:
[17:14] and get one year of this instruction and move on to your next step. While many art schools are just 11th and 12th, or you have to come into ninth grade. So we have access throughout the years. And the way the process works is we start advertising our application and audition calendar early in the school year. It opens for students in eighth grade to 11th grade to apply in October. At that point, we offer visitations for school counselors. Families can always call and say, I have an eighth grader. I'd love to take a tour. We do that. We try and give as much personal attention as possible. And then we offer every Greenville County middle school and high school the chance to come to the school for a two-hour tour and Q&A. We help the students with their applications and guide them through the audition process that way. So I try and make it as accessible as we can. Anyone who's interested in being a supporter, I would welcome to follow a similar track. They can reach out for a tour. They can come to a concert. They can also access our school through the nonprofit. Our Fine Arts Center Partners is the 501c3 for the school that was started in 2012, but revamped in 2020. And the results of that revamping have been better than what we had hoped.

Vee Popat:
[18:39] That organization provides, covers class fees for all of our pupils in poverty, field trips for pupils in poverty, has done over $300,000 in artist residencies. We just awarded $51,000 in scholarships to 29 students who would like to study at summer intensives across the globe. So there's a lot of support from that organization. Folks who would like to give should work through that organization and they can do that through their website, which is very simple. It's facpartners.org.

Katy Smith:
[19:13] Wonderful. Well, we'll put links in the show notes to these things and just really appreciate how accessible you make the Fine Arts Center for the community at large. I'm sure that it is so helpful to the students to have an audience that does go beyond their parents and friends, because that's what many of them are aspiring to have post-graduation. And it's a great way to be connected to this wonderful gem.

Vee Popat:
[19:36] It is. And I appreciate you giving us a platform through the podcast. And I appreciate folks' interests. One of the things that I encountered when I came here six years ago was a lot of folks who didn't know who we were, what we did, and where we were located. And it is our mission as an organization so that every student and family in Greenville County knows that this is an option for them. So if they have dreams of being a filmmaker, there is a free program, pre-professional, accessible school where they can get those skills and explore whether they would like to do that or not. So that is our mission that we're continuing to do is just try and be more of a known product, I guess, for lack of a better term, quantity within the community, so that students, if they have those dreams, can follow them here.

Katy Smith:
[20:36] Wonderful. Well, congratulations on your 50-year anniversary, and here's to many, many more. And thanks so much for joining us, Vee.

Vee Popat:
[20:43] Thank you, Katy. Cheers. Thank you very much for the opportunity.

Catherine Puckett: Simple Civics: Greenville County is a project of Greater Good Greenville. Greater Good Greenville was catalyzed by the merger of the Nonprofit Alliance and the Greenville Partnership for Philanthropy. You can learn more on our website at greatergoodgreenville.org.