Creative Arts Center | Photo by Grace Ramsdell | The Wright State Guardian
The ArtsGala has been canceled for this year due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, and the College of Liberal Arts (COLA) worked heavily to provide support for their students despite the cancelation.
This is the second year in a row that the ArtsGala has been canceled. The last in-person event was in 2019 at the Creative Arts Center.
Planning for the future
Planning for the event, which would have occurred on April 17, takes a whole year, and the Director of Events and Community for COLA Nick Warrington brainstormed different solutions for another cancellation in the early fall of 2020.
“While we tried to remain optimistic the whole time that we were going to have an in-person event, I was already on the backside planning out Option B and C and D and E and F, building out every scenario possible to try and make ArtsGala work in some way, shape or form,” Warrington said.
According to Warrington, if the ArtsGala would have taken place in person, it would have been split into two events that were each three hours long with about 200 people at each event. There would have also been two 20-by-70-foot tents situated outside with the majority of ArtsGala taking place in these tents.
Another reason that the ArtsGala will not be held this year is that the college would not have been able to produce the same experience that their patrons have come to enjoy over the past 20 years.
“You’re constantly moving around, you’re seeing all of these different performances, and that’s what we weren’t going to be able to do in a safe manner,” Warrington said. “We were not going to be able to let people just wander around and go into rooms where we weren’t able to control capacity and exposure, and quite frankly, we didn’t want to have to be the mask police.”
Supporting students
The main purpose of ArtsGala is to support COLA students through the ArtsGala Scholarship Fund. During an average year, approximately $200,000 is raised for this fund, according to a press release. After ArtsGala 2021 was canceled, those in charge created new opportunities to raise money for those students.
One of those opportunities comes from a partnership with Global Love Dayton to create limited-edition snow globes celebrating Wright State University (WSU). A total of 250 snow globes will be made and they are currently available for pre-order on the ArtsGala website for $125 each. If the snow globes sell out, $20,000 will be raised for the ArtsGala Scholarship Fund.
Owner of Global Love Dayton Kelly Lehman hopes to provide a way to capture the heart and spirit of WSU and provide a way for the community to show its love after what it has endured, while also reaching that $20,000 goal.
“There’s so much to be proud of that has gotten lost in the negative noise,” Lehman said. “I hope the globes are catalysts for enhancing Raider pride.”
The university will also be holding a phone-a-thon campaign and an online silent auction to benefit its students. More information about the silent auction will be announced shortly.
WSU also partnered with Dayton Classical Radio to air a pre-recorded concert featuring students from the School of Music. That concert will air on April 17 at 10 a.m. on WDPR 88.1 FM.
