GREENSBORO, NC.-The Weatherspoon Art Museum at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro (UNCG) has been awarded a grant of $50,000 from the Lincoln Financial Foundation for a Museum Education Services Expansion initiative.

The Lincoln Foundation’s Arts and Culture grant supports arts and culture endeavors through programs and/or sponsorships that demonstrate increasing accessibility to the arts across all economic strata with an emphasis on school children and under served, handicapped, and new audiences.

Weatherspoon staff members received news of the grant last week and were ready to begin working on the expanded education programs. “We are truly grateful for their positive consideration of our proposal, and we are excited about the many significant educational and outreach projects we now will be able to develop,” said director Nancy Doll. “We will now be positioned to move forward with such programs as our continuing ‘New Art/New Audiences’ audience development project and new versions of it for teens and corporations.”

In addition to expanding the Weatherspoon’s New Arts/New Audience program, the Lincoln Foundation award will also be used to create Lincoln Financial Thursday Nights at the Weatherspoon, which will feature free monthly programs targeted to adults within the Greater Greensboro community. Including films, guest lectures, and concerts; the series will premiere this fall and continue through 2008.

With the implementation of these and other proposed programs and outreach efforts, the Weatherspoon expects to increase its current annual attendance. “In doing so,” stated Weatherspoon curator of education Ann Grimaldi, “we hope to demonstrate the effect our programs and outreach efforts make in reaching new audiences, in particular those from outside the primary geographic areas of regular Weatherspoon visitors.”

Lincoln Financial Foundation Grant Program Overview

The Lincoln Foundation is the charitable giving arm of Lincoln Financial Group. Under Lincoln Foundation guidelines, grants are made in the areas of education/workforce development, arts/culture and human services. Lincoln Financial sets aside up to two percent of its pre-tax earnings for charitable causes that support philanthropic endeavors in the communities where its employees live and work.

The Lincoln Foundation is committed to impacting the quality of life in the communities where their employees work by supporting life-long learning regardless of ability, promoting workforce development, providing for basic survival needs, and increasing access to the arts for individuals across all economic strata.

Lincoln Financial believes in the concept of the collective community—where everyone has a role in making the community a better place to live, work, go to school and raise a family. “We understand that businesses and people thrive in healthy, vibrant communities, so we take very seriously our responsibility to contribute to the betterment of the communities in which we live and work,” stated Lincoln Foundation Program Officer Sol Kovach.