Quantifying Accomplishments

Last week marked the one year anniversary of the first ever JWS Online class.

I spent the last several days quantifying our community accomplishments as part of our one year anniversary celebration, and it was amazing to see everything our studio community has done together laid out in black and white. High five, Team JWS!

OK, let’s get real. There is a flip side of this too.

The number of days in the last year that I felt like giving up: 365.

The number of months in the last year that I desperately needed to lean on my team for support: 12.

The number of hours per day I spent worrying about how to keep our community safe and creative: 24.

I could go on but you get the point. It is not easy to move through all of the doubt and fear. But it is so worth it, and it makes celebrating the accomplishments that much sweeter.

To my beloved JWS community, take a look at what you did this year!!! Thank you for showing up, for leaning in, for holding each other up, and for choosing faith over fear. You give me hope for the future.

It would take pages and pages to share every single accomplishment, so instead please enjoy a selection of accomplishments made possible by our amazing community of Artists at JWS Online.

JWS Online has served:

615 artists in
39 states and
13 countries.

In the last 12 months we have offered classes in acting, directing, filmmaking, storytelling, creating, music directing, movement, self-taping, puppetry, mask work, goal setting, script analysis, website design, entrepreneurship, job-seeking, Shakespeare, comedy, phonetics, clowning, pop/rock, mindfulness, history, musical theatre, and more.

We helped artists secure employment.

We helped entrepreneurs launch businesses.

We helped educators learn how to teach in a virtual classroom.

We created the Allied Artists Sponsorship program and awarded 126 sponsorships to BIMPOC and LGBTQ+ Artists.

We created the Jorge E. Maldonado Evolving Artists Fellowship.

We created the new Changemaker Scholarship.

We created the JWS Leadership Cohort.

We held over 70 free events for the JWS community, from community calls to book groups to readings of plays and musicals to film festivals to performance nights to community parties.

Most importantly, we did this together! Everybody chipped in and made it possible to build a community that we are proud to be a part of.

Thank you, JWS!