# Beyond Membership
# Building Collective Power for Teaching Artists
It has been a while since I returned to this series.
After publishing Divide and Conquer: Why Teaching Artists Struggle to Mobilize Collectively (read the two-part series), and after I returned from TAMA’s retreat and the Maryland Arts Summit where we presented our fair pay ranges and rate builder, I intentionally stepped back.
I wanted to listen to perspectives and observe actions the field was taking. Structures are being rebuilt, which is concerning to me.
We haven't answered: What kind of infrastructure actually creates collective power for Teaching Artists?
Because access and power are not the same thing.
# Access and power are not the same thing.
Over the last several years, there has been meaningful movement toward recognizing Teaching Artists as essential contributors across education, health, community development, economic vitality, and beyond.
More organizations are creating pathways for Teaching Artists to connect, learn, and participate in broader arts ecosystems.
These efforts matter.
But are we building systems where Teaching Artists participate, or systems where Teaching Artists have influence?
Because they are not the same.
# The Difference Between Membership and Movement
Membership models can create important opportunities. They can connect people who might otherwise remain isolated. They can provide resources, information, and relationships. Teaching Artists of the Mid-Atlantic (TAMA) has a membership model.
But membership alone does not necessarily change the conditions under which people work.
A Teaching Artist can join an organization.
A Teaching Artist can attend conferences.
A Teaching Artist can access professional development.
And yet, they may still navigate:
- inconsistent pay structures
- short-term contracts
- lack of benefits
- limited decision-making power
- unclear professional standards
- competition for limited opportunities
This is the tension that I think has disrupted our ability to professionalize teaching artistry. It is the obstacle at the center of our organizing.
Individual participation can create connection.
Collective action creates power.
When multiple organizations seek to recruit Teaching Artists as members without centering Teaching Artist leadership and collective power, we risk creating competing pathways for individual access rather than a shared infrastructure for collective action.
My goal is not to have fewer organizations supporting Teaching Artists.
I believe the goal is stronger alignment around who has voice, who sets standards, and who shapes the future of the field.
# Individual participation can create connection. Collective action creates power.
# The Conditions That Shape Behavior
In Divide and Conquer, I wrote about how fragmentation is not simply a result of Teaching Artists being independent.
It is a condition created by the structure of the field.
Teaching Artists work across:
- organizations
- sectors
- geographic regions
- employment classifications
- artistic disciplines
We are constantly navigating different systems, expectations, and relationships.
Those conditions shape behavior.
When access to work is uncertain, individuals understandably protect relationships.
When opportunities are scarce, competition can replace collaboration.
When recognition and resources are unevenly distributed, people focus on securing their own stability.
These are rational responses to unstable conditions.
But they also make collective action extremely difficult, much like the conditions many labor movements have had to overcome.
# When a system has normalized scarcity, improved conditions for one group can feel like a threat to another.
# A Lesson From Labor Movements
Throughout history, workers seeking to mobilize have had to overcome a similar challenge: convincing people that collective improvement does not require individual sacrifice while navigating the fears, competing interests, and resistance that can divide workers from one another.
My brother, a union leader in New York City, recently shared a story about labor organizing among housekeepers. During early organizing efforts, supervisors resisted because they feared what improved wages and benefits might mean for their own roles and compensation.
Their experience is not unique.
When systems are built around scarcity, improvements for one group can feel like a threat to another.
But the entire structure often shifts when the lowest-paid workers gain stability.
When housekeepers receive better wages, benefits, and protections, supervisors and administrators may also gain greater leverage to advocate for improved working conditions.
A stronger workforce does not have to threaten the people working alongside that workforce.
It can strengthen the entire system.
# What Arts Administrators Should Consider
Arts administrators are often navigating difficult systems too.
Many are managing limited budgets, competing priorities, and institutional pressures.
This is not a conversation about blaming administrators.
It is a conversation about recognizing shared interests.
A Teaching Artist workforce with:
- fair compensation
- sustainable contracts
- access to benefits
- professional standards
- meaningful voice in decisions
does not weaken arts organizations.
It strengthens them.
# A stronger workforce does not have to threaten the people working alongside that workforce. It can strengthen the entire system.
I have personally been asked by an administrator:
“Why should Teaching Artists make more than me?”
As someone with more than 30 years of experience, I found this question difficult to answer. I continue to enter contract negotiations where the initial rate offered is comparable to what I earned more than 20 years ago. My income is unstable, and the rate I negotiate is not equivalent to a salary. It must cover self-employment taxes, health insurance and other benefits, liability insurance, retirement savings, travel, administrative work, and the many costs of operating a small business. Comparing a Teaching Artist's contract rate to an employee's salary overlooks the fundamentally different economic realities each represents.
Teaching Artists are not asking to be valued above others. But the very people creating significant public, social, and cultural value are still operating within compensation structures and professional standards that have not evolved with the work.
When a system has normalized scarcity, improved conditions for one group can feel like a threat to another. I assure you that we are not asking to take something away from others. We are asking for systems that recognize the full value of the work and create conditions where everyone within the ecosystem has greater stability, voice, and opportunity.
Healthier systems create opportunities throughout the ecosystem.
Let’s ask: What becomes possible when the people on the front lines of the work have greater stability and power?
Because the resources already exist within the broader arts ecosystem.
Let’s ask: How are those resources distributed? Who has influence over those decisions?
# Why Artist-Led Infrastructure Matters
I believe in Teaching Artists of the Mid-Atlantic (TAMA) and regional Teaching Artist-led networks.
They serve my aim and purpose. It’s a unique function and model for Teaching Artists.
While membership organizations that support the broader arts ecosystem are valuable, they can only provide connection, resources, visibility, and opportunities.
Organizations built by and accountable to Teaching Artists create collective infrastructure.
Supporting Teaching Artists and building Teaching Artist power are related, but they are not the same work.
They create spaces where Teaching Artists can:
- identify shared conditions
- establish standards
- build relationships across fragmentation
- advocate from lived experience
- imagine solutions rooted in the realities of the work
These efforts are not in competition with arts organizations or those field-wide membership organizations.
They are necessary, critical partners in building a sustainable field.
# The Work Ahead
The work ahead requires listening, and specifically to those most vulnerable in the arts education and lifelong learning field. Listen to Teaching Artists.
Not listening only when the conversation confirms what you may already believe.
Not listening only when solutions are comfortable.
Listening even when the existing structure is challenged.
Teaching Artists are not asking to dismantle the systems that support this work.
We are asking to help build systems that recognize the value already being created.
Teaching Artists are not asking to dismantle the systems that support this work. We are asking to help build systems that recognize the value already being created.
When Teaching Artists thrive, the communities they serve thrive too.
And when Teaching Artists have meaningful influence over the conditions of their work, the entire field becomes stronger.
Are you willing to build tables where Teaching Artists who challenge the system shape what comes next?
Read More
Divide and Conquer, Part 2
In part 2, I further examine how fragmentation in Teaching Artistry is built into systems of pay, contracting, classification, and training. I argue that this requires structural clarity, shared standards, and enforceable systems that reflect the full scope of Teaching Artist labor.
Divide and Conquer: Why Teaching Artists Struggle to Mobilize Collectively
The field shapes Teaching Artists through structural fragmentation across geography, disciplines, employment systems, and institutional access. These overlapping systems produce uneven value, scarcity, and separation between “inside” and “outside” positions, limiting connection and hindering collective organizing. With collective commitment, Teaching Artists can move from fragmentation toward power.
The Hidden Labor of Teaching Artists
This piece exposes the full scope of Teaching Artist labor. Before, between, during, and after the visible moment of a session, and how most of it goes uncompensated. This invisibility is not accidental, but structural, with artists absorbing the cost of sustaining programs. The result is a system that depends on hidden labor while failing to fully recognize or resource the professionals doing the work.
Stop Training Teaching Artists. Start Paying Them.
Teaching Artists are often told the solution is more training. We are missing the real issues: a lack of compensation, trust, and power-sharing with artists. Teaching Artists know what the work demands, and when they have felt valued and supported in doing their best work.
Outside the Gate: A Story About Excellence in Teaching Artistry
This personal reflection traces my journey as a Teaching Artist working outside what is traditionally considered “respected” theatre. It asks a central question: if the work has always been excellent, why have our systems struggled to recognize, resource, and value it?
We Don’t Have a Training Problem. We Have a Pay Problem.
This follow-up builds on the growing conversation sparked by my recent post. It clarifies what’s at stake for Teaching Artists and lays the groundwork for a series of deeper explorations into fair pay, hidden labor, systemic barriers, and what it will take to move from dialogue to action.
Stop Rebuilding What Already Exists: Teaching Artists Are Leading the Field
The Teaching Artist field does not need to be rebuilt. It needs to be recognized and resourced. This piece exposes the cycle of extractive “listening,” highlights the work already being led by Teaching Artists, and calls for a shift in power, compensation, and accountability.