Grantor Name: Arizona Community Foundation’s Michael Goodwin Foundation
Program Name: Arts Programming for Adult Artists with Disabilities
Grant Amount: $25,000
Recipient Name: Detour Company Theatre
Overview of Use of Funds: Good Works Grant Writing is ecstatic to congratulate our client, Detour Company Theatre, for being awarded a $25,000 Community Support Grant from the Michael Goodwin Foundation via the Arizona Community Foundation. Funding will provide vital general operating support for Detour’s high-quality performing arts programming during 2022 and 2023, including: 1) Detour’s Mainstage Troupe: Full-scale musical theatre programming; 2) BOOTs Camp: Prerequisite training to Mainstage Troupe/Detour on Tour for new artists; 3) The Academy: Year-round classes, clubs, and workshops in performing arts; and 4) Detour on Tour: Traveling full-scale theatre productions into community spaces.
Overview of Grant Objective/Impact: Artistic and creative expression is critical to sustaining each person’s lifelong quality of life, development, and well-being, with a robust supply of research confirming its many social, emotional, and physical benefits. Detour strives to champion community-building, social-emotional well-being, individual creativity, and self-activism by helping adult artists with disabilities develop vital skills needed to express and advocate for themselves, thus contributing to critical social change by displaying to the greater community the incredible artistry and capabilities of this marginalized community. Detour was founded to fill the vacuum of theatre opportunities available and accessible to the 25.8% of adult Arizona residents who have some type of disability, such as those with intellectual and developmental disabilities, autism, and down syndrome, the blind and visual impaired, the Deaf and hard of hearing and other conditions requiring additional support and adaptive techniques. A $25,000 Community Support Grant from the Michael Goodwin Foundation will help Detour Company Theatre’s 2022-2023 programming to engage 75-100 artists, 20-25 volunteer coaches, and an estimated 1,750-2,250 audience members.