The Windgate Foundation has given $10 million to Eureka Springs School of the Arts for a new endowment to provide ongoing operating support to the school.
The endowment, which will be held by the Arkansas Community Foundation, is expected to produce $400,000 per year after a required one-year waiting period. Most of the money from it is intended to replace annual grants that Windgate has been making for many years to ESSA. The school and foundation have collaborated for the past 15 years, and the foundation has funded multiple buildings and land acquisition, according to the school.
The rest of the endowment income will add stability to the school’s annual funding, officials said.
In addition, the foundation has provided a $400,000 bridge grant to be distributed in the first year.
“This is an exceptional and transformative investment in ESSA by a long-time and committed partner,” Kelly McDonough, executive director of the school, said in a news release. “With this support we can expect ESSA to mature into national prominence on par with blue-chip schools such as the Penland School of Crafts, Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts, and Haystack Mountain School of Crafts.”
Robyn Horn, Windgate Foundation Board chair, said the group is impressed with “the tenacity of the ESSA’s founders, the professionalism and dedication of its staff and the wide range of opportunities the school has for students to come and learn how to make art.
“Our hope is to guarantee ESSA’s future, and to inspire others to join us in supporting an organization that has such a dynamic effect on artists. Our state is becoming one that supports the arts, realizing that its impact is economic as well as inspirational.”
The school said the endowment will allow it to shift its stance to a longer-term perspective and focus future fundraising on scholarships and campus development. It will also help the school in hiring and retaining permanent staff and building programming through the recruitment of talented and magnetic instructors.
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