Alternate ROOTS
32
5
"Up" is the number of experts who agree that the nonprofit has had the most impact in the
field. "Down" is the number of experts who disagree that the nonprofit has had the most impact in field.
Headquarters Location: Atlanta, GA
Founded: 1976
Mission: Alternate ROOTS is an organization based in the Southern USA whose mission is to support the creation and presentation of original art, in all its forms, which is rooted in a particular community of place, tradition or spirit. As a coalition of cultural workers we strive to be allies in the elimination of all forms of oppression. ROOTS is committed to social and economic justice and the protection of the natural world and addresses these concerns through its programs and services.
Tags:
national, arts & culture, direct services, artist support, resource services, social equity, mentorship, grantmaking
Summary
Stories
Expert Reviews
Leadership
From the Nonprofit
Leadership
Carlton Turner.
Carlton Turner is currently the Director for Alternate ROOTS. Carlton has been a member of Alternate ROOTS since 2001 and served as the Louisiana/Mississippi representative for one year. Carlton worked as the project director for UPROOTED: The Katrina Project. This project seeks to raise the voices of Katrina's survivors and connect them with all of America's marginalized citizenry. It is…
See full bio.
Financial Data
Overhead Ratio:
n/a
Total Revenue:
$674,012
From the Nonprofit
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Contact Info
Address:
1083 Austin Ave NE
Atlanta, GA 30307, USA
Story:
Did you know that a lot of artists in the U.S. do not have sufficient health insurance? Read about how Jo Carson, a founding member of Alternate ROOTS is in the midst of a pitched battle with colon cancer:
Today is October 9, 2009, and I am 63 years old today. I go for my next to last radiation treatment for colon cancer later this morning. These treatments make me sick, and I have been very, very sick during the last 6 weeks, but when my mother was 63, she was already in the throes of early onset Alzheimer’s, and this radiation sickness hardly compares when you think about it. I’ve still got my brain in relatively good working order, and I can beat this item in my colon if I can just be still enough (moving around makes me throw up), and I try to keep that in mind.
I’m thinking a lot these days about choices I have made. Choices like--for instance-- that I didn’t carry enough insurance to pay for the riddance of this cancer. I have hospitalization insurance. I bought what I could afford, and I shopped around when I bought it, but I’m self employed, not a member of a group, and the list of exclusions on it is appalling (for instance, I’m deaf, and it won’t touch any ear or hearing troubles as a preexisting condition). Good insurance for me is 900 dollars a month, adequate is 600+ a month. I pay $330 a month for inadequate insurance with a high deductible. And I have used it twice in the last six weeks with emergency visits to the hospital for illness caused by the radiation treatments. I have so many days worth of hospital time (not very many) left on what it will pay this year, and two (I hope, I’d rather not wear a plastic bag hanging off my side for the rest of my life) surgeries to get through, one to remove the cancer, the second to reconnect the colon to the rectum when the colon is sufficiently healed.
A person doesn’t usually think of making art as a choice that entails risking one’s life, but in this country, in 2009, with the right wing still trying to pull red scare tactics (didn’t we learn anything from the McCarthy era?) and behaving like Brown Shirts at recent public health care forums, making art in this country is a choice about risking your life. I made some choices. I chose to pursue writing even if it did not pay as much as some other things might (in money or in benefits). I chose to do that because I thought it really might be important and I evidently want my life to have meaning more than I want to make money, though I am certainly not opposed to making enough money. I do make enough money to live in this world in an appropriate and comfortable way. I like living in an appropriate way. So I actually win this one, I win it right now, no matter what happens: my life, my work does have meaning to me and to others.
I gambled on basically good genetic heritage (the Alzheimer’s was scary, but they can’t fix it medically anyway) to get me to 65 and Medicare, and—to put it bluntly—I lost this bet. Game ain’t over yet, I am a tough bird, and I don’t give up easy, but I didn’t get to 65 before I needed major medical intervention.
An appeal through ROOTS—bless you every one—has raised money to help with all those “outpatient services” and the multitude of things my insurance won’t pay. I will use it as wisely as I know how. I plan, at the moment, to accumulate those bills that do not have interest connected to them, and then negotiate for what percentage on the dollar paid in the moment will retire the debt, so maybe the money can go even further than the numbers. I will repay generosity first—there has been some, and it should be encouraged.
Jo Carson is the author of more than 30 community story plays, she’s the award-winning playwright of Daytrips and many other plays for the American theater, and she’s the author of several books including Spider Speculations: A Physics and Biophysics of Storytelling and a founding member of Alternate ROOTS.
(Read more about her story at: http://alternateroots.org/node/812)
Expert Reviews of Alternate ROOTS
Evidence of Impact Summary:
Alternate Roots is hailed for its training, programming, and partnerships with arts and social justice organizations in the south. Beyond supporting artists, this organization is credited with raising awareness about issues of diversity and inequality throughout the region.See expert comments.
Organization Strengths Summary:
Nearly every expert surveyed praised the Alternate Roots leadership - their Executive Director, Carlton Turner, in particular. Others note the quality and focus of their programming as well as specific products like their newsletters as meaningful strengths.See expert comments.
Areas for Improvement Summary:
Questions about funding and sustainability were posed most frequently. Experts also noted an opportunity to expand programming outside of the south.See expert comments.
Expert Comments: Evidence of Impact
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Impact |
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This organization is developing practical ways to link arts and social justice issues through a coherent training model that artists throughout the southern US engage in as well its annual conference. This work is leading to cadre of artists who are positively impacting their communities in the south and beyond. | ||
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They have a strong mission at the intersection of arts and social justice. They are artist led and member driven; they have a major commitment to addressing issues of race, which is manifested in the entire organization. | ||
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This organization is focused on southern states, working on issues of social justice, through the arts (all disciplines). They have created "Resources for Social Change" which provides a vocabulary and matrix to both approach and measure efforts in this area. They are asking, nationally, hard questions of the field (e.g. What are the aesthetics of diversity?) and partner with national service organizations to broaden their impact and amplify their message. | ||
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Alternate Roots has championed and furthered the work of artists who working deeply in and with community. They have served as a national resource for networking and convening these artists each year and also provide professional development services and share practices to advance community arts/community building work. They have also created great visibility for this work and have communicated the value of the artists who work in this arena and who provide essential services to their communities. | ||
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This organization, originally begun as a regional theater/arts network has really been working to redefine itself. Under new leadership, the organization is once again creating significant opportunities for artists and organizations working in community to touch the lives of people across the country. | ||
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For nearly 35 years, Alternate Roots has been connecting artists who work closely with communities of tradition, place, and spirit. Alternate Roots provides a crucial network in an under-served sector of the arts and culture field, offers funding support for projects and individual development, and brings issues of arts and activism to prominence at a national level. | ||
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Alternate Roots boasts effective convening, training programs, cultural organizing programs, and is an effective partner in the South linking art and social justice. They seriously engage issues of race and class by making dismantling racism part of their mission. | ||
Expert Comments: Organization Strengths
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Leadership & Publications |
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The Executive Director of this organization, Carlton Turner, is a dynamic and thoughtful leader and the newsletter of this organization is useful and thought provoking. | ||
Leadership & Alumni Strength |
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Alternate Roots is a regional organization that has major national impact because of its vision and leadership. Re-granting programs and its annual meeting are important, ongoing programs. They have an amazing group of alumnae. | ||
Leadership & Program Design |
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Alternate Roots has a very smart and dynamic leader in Carlton Turner. Supporting him is a small, dedicated staff that is committed to the organization's mission. Their small size allows the company to maintain a degree of "nimble-ness," while a clear mission ensures that the work advances their issues forward. | ||
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The leadership of Director Carlton Turner and Board Chair Ashley Sparks has led the organization through a challenging leadership transition. This process led to an open dialogue with all members, and ultimately has strengthened the learning process through active participation of members. Alternate Roots supports those artistic projects that exist on the fringe: rural, grass-roots programs and artistic opportunities. | ||
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Alternate Roots has a very strong staff of committed leaders, all of whom are practicing artists; they are supported by a 100+ member board of directors and work very closely with the organization's executive committee. Their annual meeting is its best known program, a 5 1/2 day gathering of artists and cultural workers where skills are developed, new work is tested, new relationships are forged, and longstanding collaborations are deepened. | ||
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They have strong leadership of color that includes artists, a democratic and participatory structure, and an ability to change with the times and bring in new generations. | ||
Program Design |
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They are artist-centric, artist-driven and directed. The organization stays very close to its constituents and also balances the tradition of service and dedication to meeting artist needs with leading artists, moving the artist field forward. | ||
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Alternate Roots' strength is that it builds community; it helps artists/organizations particularly from an area of the country where the art created has a perception of being of lesser aesthetic value, because it involves community. It addresses an artistic and ethnic community that is undervalued and under-represented. I think that its leadership is growing stronger with the organization and it is finding a clearer vision as to how to operate on a national/policy making level. | ||
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This group has been around for a long time and made a huge difference in the lives of people not visible to most. They integrate community organizing with arts and creativity and the results are magical. | ||
Expert Comments: Areas for Improvement
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The organization should expand its reach beyond the South. | ||
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This is a small staff, high impact organization: they do a whole lot with a little. Because their mission is tied to social justice causes, their offerings stress this part of the mission over the "art" part of the mission. They could offer more opportunities in artistic development to its constituents. Also, because they are so good at advancing mission, I wonder if there are more opportunities to work with/mentor other organizations outside their geographic area. Perhaps through their partnerships? | ||
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Vagaries of funding have meant that budget has never exceeded $500k and it often hovers around $300k; from time to time there have been leadership succession issues which have led to lost institutional memory. Also their curatorial practices are sometimes weak. | ||
Sustainability & Operations |
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The organization is working on sustainability, building stronger strategic and program planning, marketing and operating capacities, and then finding ways to help their constituents gain the same capacities. | ||
Staff & Organization |
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As the organization continues to move into its next chapter of life, staff support is a key arena and opportunity of growth. This is connected in many ways to the organization's financial stability, which is on an upswing. Additionally, Board Development (as it relates to organizational structure) could be revisited. Their open-door policy related to board participation could be fine-tuned and streamlined to provide more focused participation opportunities for those artists and administrators who serve as board members. | ||
Recognition & Membership Engagement |
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Alternate Roots suffers from a visibility deficit; as a member-driven service organization in the South, it is hard for them to get on the radar for all but a few demographic sectors. With few public operations to engage a wider audience, they must rely on members and well-informed leaders in the arts and culture field to build recognition. Another area for improvement is finding ways to keep members engaged during the other 51 weeks of the year when we are not at the annual meeting. While much investment has gone into the members' section of www.alternateroots.org, using it as a means for on-going connection is still a challenge. | ||
Funding |
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They could use more sustainable funding. | ||
Leadership
Carlton Turner
Director
Director
From the Nonprofit
The nonprofit has not added any comments yet. If you are a representative of this nonprofit and would like to leave a comment, please email us at
feedback@myphilanthropedia.org
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