Sentinel photo by LIV SUYDAM Rebecca Myers, of the Perry County Council of the Arts, speaks to the Juniata County Rotary Club Thursday at a meeting at the Port Royal Community Building. Pictured around the table are, counter-clockwise from left, Brent Miller, Kenneth Stubbs, Robert Zeak, Seth Moseby, Steven Manbeck, Bernice and Fred Naylor.

PORT ROYAL — Rebecca Myers from the Perry County Council of the Arts (PCCA) attended the Juniata County Rotary Club meeting Thursday afternoon to speak on the Arts in Education partnership.

Following the announcements and normal activities of the Rotary’s agenda, the program began with Myers discussing information on the Perry County Council of the Arts, based in Newport.

According to their website, Perry County Council of the Arts has been “building a community through the arts, and seeks to re-imagine creativity in our rural landscape,” and this has been a goal since 1982.

Myers shared information on the council including the Landis House Museum in Newport, the classes and camps they offer, as well as exhibits, concerts and the art on tour, which is when “local businesses in Perry County will display some of the art work.”

“We do a youth art day for all of Perry County, so all the teachers in Perry County submit artwork,” shared Myers.

Currently, there is a big public art project occurring in Perry County. All nine boroughs are working on a public art project with committees working together all for the “revitalization and being a part of what’s called the main street program,” said Myers.

All of the work to “re-imagine creativity” is done through four programs, however the main focus of Myers attending the Rotary meeting was to discuss the Arts in Education program which is a partnership between the Perry County council and the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts.

Myers said the state government agency split the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts into 14 regions. Perry County’s council receives money as region 10, which includes seven counties: Perry, Juniata, Mifflin, Union, Montour, Northumberland and Snyder.

“We get 30,000 dollars from the CommonWealth to put artists in residence in every single one of those counties, at least one program each year,” Myers said.

The money that is provided by the state, must be matched by the location hosting the artist, which can be done through foundation grants, EITC support, contributions from local businesses and PTO fundraising, according to a presentation briefing handed out at the meeting.

Artists in Residence typically attend a school for five days but they can stay as long as 30 days, Myers said.

“What we do at Perry County Council of the Arts is we vet the artist, we have an application procedure, we review their work, we do all the contracts, we get all the money in and make sure everything is paid for, so we do all that sort of in between work that needs to be done to make something successful.

In the presentation brief, a few of the artists in residence were mentioned, including: Jason Reed – dance, Ellen Jamiolkowski – clay and Brianne Croteau – self-portraiture.

Myers also shared plans of bringing a muralist to the Juniata area that will work with students to get ideas and come up with ideas.

The Arts in Education also receives money for the Poetry Out Loud which is a national competition that starts at the local level with teachers creating a competition within the school. From there, the winner will move on to regional, then state and the national competition held in Washington D.C.

“We’ve had good participation from Juniata, East Juniata, and Newport,” Myers said. “Unfortunately we haven’t been able to pull other schools in as much as we would like.”

Last year, three students, Jordan Knouse from Newport High School, Natalie Popp from Juniata High School and Jordana Steffen from East Juniata High School competed.

Myers also took time in the meeting to discuss the Education Improvement Tax Credit. Any business in Pennsylvania can ask to be a part of the program. They apply for it and then can get a tax credit on their state taxes, Myers said.

Then the money can be donated to education – an approved organization, such as the Perry County Council of the Arts.