Make a Gift!

Each year at the holidays, we share the BSA Gift Catalog with our families, alumni, FANS and friends. This special fundraising initiative
helps us ensure that all of our students have the supplies and materials they need to succeed at BSA, both artistically and academically. We receive only about $100 for each high school student for supplies and materials from the Baltimore City Public School System, and, as you can imagine, this does not begin to cover actual expenses. Families contribute to the cost for their own children, but the specialized materials required by an art school are expensive and we still need help.

Through our Gift Catalog, you can make a contribution to a department that is special to you. We have suggested amounts for all the different funds to illustrate the kinds of expenses we must meet, but would welcome a contribution in any amount. For a donation in honor of a friend, a loved one, a child, or grandchild, we will send a festive acknowledgement card. This year, we are also pleased to introduce our new BSA Note Cards. These cards, blank on the inside, feature beautiful photos of our students at work and make an elegant gift for the holidays.

From all of us at Baltimore School for the Arts, thank you for your support and all the best this holiday season!

Art Supply Fund

In the hands of one of our students, a ream of drawing paper and a box of charcoal could become a masterpiece. Help us purchase critical supplies for our aspiring artists – brushes and paint, pastels, pencils and erasers, modeling clay and tools. Whatever the medium, incredible things will happen! A year’s worth of drawing supplies costs about $150, painting supplies $200. Modeling clay and tools cost about $100. $600 covers everything for one art student for one year.

The Dean’s List Fund

In addition to their rigorous arts training, our students are also expected to excel in their academic courses and to score high on standardized tests. To help them attain this goal and to prepare them for top colleges and universities, we’ve established academic support and enhancement programs. We offer students PSAT/SAT preparation classes and AP Testing, a summer bridge program, and Saturday tutoring. Each hour of support instruction costs $75.

Piano Fund

Pianos are essential for musical training. They are used to accompany all vocal and instrumental students in private lessons, for music theory and music literature classes, for demonstrations and instruction, and for chorus. The school currently has 20 pianos that were purchased in 1979 and while they are regularly tuned and carefully maintained, they receive a lot of wear and tear and will have to be replaced. We hope to replace about three or four pianos a year for the next five years. A new piano costs about four thousand dollars. A contribution of $100 would pay for a piano tuning. $500 would help us build our piano replacement fund.

Play-of-the-Month Fund

Put a script in one of our actor’s hands and it is immediately devoured. Our theatre students are required to study at least one play every month as part of their professional training. In four years, our young actors read a minimum of forty plays! The Pinter, Miller, Ibsen and, of course, Shakespeare scripts are underlined, highlighted, pages dog-eared, and their bindings are virtually destroyed from use. $60 would put a six-month’s supply of scripts in the hands of an aspiring actor. $120 would buy a year’s supply.

Pointe Shoes, Snowflakes, and Sugar Plums

A venerated tradition at BSA, The Nutcracker, has returned this year. Our dancers are performing this holiday favorite here at school and also at Meyerhoff Symphony Hall in December. Many pairs of pointe shoes will be used, and many new costumes have been designed! $300 puts a dancer in costume and pointe shoes. Pointe shoes alone cost $80 a pair.

Set Production Fund

Our set production students build the sets for our productions from scratch. They use drills, saws, staplers and innumerable other tools to do this work. They also learn how to use sophisticated lighting, computer and recording equipment – skills they will take to college and to their careers as they pursue their craft. We must constantly replenish and upgrade our equipment for these students. Costs run the gamut, from $50 for instructional materials to $150 for a power tool or $600 for a digital camcorder.

21st Century Fund

To prepare our students for professional careers, we must keep current with rapidly changing technologies and provide state-of-the-art equipment. In our new spaces, we are wired (and wireless) for the 21st century but we don’t have all of the hardware or software we need for our academic and arts computer labs. A contribution to this fund would help us keep our scholar/artists on pace for the 21st century.

A Year of TWIGS

Our after school and Saturday arts training program is offered “free” to the community and enables us to provide high quality programs in dance, music, theatre and visual arts for the city’s elementary and middle school children. Many of these children will join us in the high school and continue on to careers in the arts. But the program isn’t really free – it’s funded by a generous group of donors. $800 will provide one child with a year of classes through TWIGS and perhaps launch a promising young artist.

Make a Donation