Tips

Tips to run Inspirations at the school level:

Have a volunteer head up a committee of at least 3 members who run the program at your school.  This can be made up of teachers or parents and guardians of your students.  Organize your Inspirations committee at the beginning of the school year, or before if possible.

Decide which categories your school will enter.  You may offer all nine categories to your student body, or just one or two if you prefer.

Divide the categories up between committee members.  Each person should be very familiar with the rules of each category they are over.  As entries are turned in, make sure entry forms are complete and legible.  Check each entry to ensure that the Inspirations rules have been followed.  Have a plan on how you will deal with entries that do not comply with the rules.  Entries that do not comply should not be sent on to the region level.  Entries that have been plagiarized should always be disqualified. 

Set up a timeline that includes dates for the following items:

-         Introduction of Inspirations to teachers, students and parents.

-         Confirm judges

-         Entry due date

-         Judging dates.  (Determine ahead of time if you will accept late entries and how you will handle them.)

-         Awards assembly and artwork display

Allow a minimum of 2-3 weeks between your entry due date and your awards assembly.  You’ll need time to check the entries, get judging done and prepare awards.

Find 2 judges for each category.  Judges need to be people with expertise in the specified category.  In order to maintain impartiality please find judges not associated with your school.  Student's names should not be visible during judging.  Here are some ideas of how to find qualified judges:

• Art, literature, and music educators; college/university professors.
• Teachers from other schools participating in the Inspirations program.
• Art museum directors, docents, curators, or historians.
• Professional photographers, local artisans.
• Local symphony orchestra or choral directors, musicians, conductors, composers.
• Newspaper journalists, editors, photographers.
• Local television stations, multimedia/video production companies
• University film or theatre students
• Librarians, local authors
• Local dance conservatories, dance studios, ballets, or theaters
• Arts advocacy organization president, director.

Inviting professionals in the arts or influential community leaders to participate in the judging process will bring positive attention to your school and the programs you offer that are helping students advance.  Be sure to thank and recognize your judges.

Get your school’s teachers involved!  Your school level program will have greater success if you have the support of your teachers.  Ask them to talk to their classes about ways to enter as well as encourage them to do so.  Some may want to offer Inspirations as a class assignment or as extra credit.

Promote the program.  Provide rules and deadlines to your teachers and administration in advance, then pass out copies to students and families through a kick-off meeting or assembly, in school newsletters or at another event.  Post deadlines and contact information on your school website.  Use posters and flyers.  Remind your student body during morning announcements once or twice a week.  Send home a reminder to all families 5-7 days before your entry due date.

Celebrate each entry.  If possible, hold an awards assembly.  This can be done during school or in the evening.  Display every entry.  Have any electronic equipment needed for viewing of recorded entries.  (Musical Composition, Film/Video, Dance/Choreography.)  If you hold an assembly, you can choose to highlight a few of the performing arts entries as part of your program.  Each entry should receive at least a certificate of participation.  You can find a template on our blog.

MyRibbons.com and Payson Trophy (801.465.2551) both have die templates of the Inspirations logo.  You can choose to use them for any school level awards and save your school the cost of creating a die template.

** It will be your responsibility to get the entries that have been selected to move on to compete at the region level to the school hosting your region.  Please be sure to deliver them ON TIME!  The school hosting your region is not obligated to delay judging or the awards assembly if you are late turning entries in.  Please be respectful to them and to your students.

If you are unable to attend your region awards assembly or the state awards assembly, please make sure someone else will be there to represent your school and take home entries.  Once you have received details about your regions level awards assembly, please pass that information on to your students.

Return all entries to the creator then treat yourself to a massage for a job well done.

 Tips to run Inspirations at the regional level:

Running Inspirations at the region level is a lot less time consuming than it is at the school level.  If possible, use the same committee (or at least one person from it) who ran it at your school.  They will already understand the program, the rules and the judging guidelines.  Just as at the school level, it will be helpful to have at least 3 people help with this level of the program.

Each year, the Inspirations Board sets the deadline for the completion of all levels of the competition.  These dates are firm and must be adhered to.  Regions are determined each year based on which schools are participating.  Once participation is confirmed regions are determined and host schools are selected.  Each region host will receive contact information for the schools in their region and schools receive contact information for their region host.  As the region host it is your responsibility to communicate with the schools in your region regarding artwork collection and the awards night event.  Send this information to each school about a week before the deadline for the school level competition to be completed, and then send a reminder email about 2 weeks before the awards assembly.  Each school will pass the details on to their students.

Divide the categories up between committee members.  Each person should be very familiar with the rules of each category they are over.  Entries should have been checked for rule compliance at the school level.  Please double check them.  Entries that do not comply should not be sent to region level judges. 

Set up a timeline that includes dates for the following items:

-         Date for artwork collection as determined by the State Inspirations Board.

-         Confirm judges

-         Judging completion.  If you choose to send entries home with your judges, they should only need a day or two to complete judging.

-         Date for winner name submissions to State Inspirations Board for medal purchases.

-         Communication deadlines.

Find 2 judges for each category.  Judges need to be people with expertise in the specified category.  In order to maintain impartiality please find judges not associated with any school in your region.  Please do not re-use judges used at the school level programs.  Student's names should not be visible during judging.  Students should not put their names on their artwork.  If they do then the names need to be covered prior to judging; however, the method of covering the name must not be permanent.  Follow tips found at the school level to find your judges.  Be sure to thank and recognize your judges.

The Awards Assembly should celebrate every entry.  Display entries by either category or school.  Have any electronic equipment needed for viewing of recorded entries.  (Musical Composition, Film/Video, Dance/Choreography.)  You can choose to ask students of 3D Art entries to bring the actual art work to the assembly to display.  You can choose to highlight a few of the performing arts entries as part of the program.  If you do this, be sure to involve multiple schools.  Each entry needs to receive a certificate of participation.  (First Place, Second Place, Honorable Mention, and Awards of Excellence).  Please see the certificate template section of the Inspirations blog for details.  Entries moving on to the state level (1^st and 2^nd place winners in each category and age group) will receive medals as part of your assembly.

When the assembly is over, collect the entries that are moving on to the state level (1^st and 2^nd place winners in each category and age group) and ask a representative from each school to take back to their school the rest of the entries as well as certificates and medals of any student not present.  Arrange for the return of any entries left at your school after the assembly within one week.

We understand that people’s lives are busy and that some may have to travel a good distance to attend the Region Awards Assembly.  Expect to have parents or school administration ask you to release the names of winners ahead of time.  We have a strict policy that names are NOT given out before the assemblies.  One major goal of the Inspirations program is to encourage our children to be creative and express themselves through the arts and then celebrate them when they do.  We want our awards assemblies to be about more than just who won.  Please remind your schools of this policy when you give them the deadline and assembly information.

** It will be your responsibility to get the entries that have been selected to move on to compete at the state level (1^st and 2^nd place winners in each category and age group) to the school hosting the State Awards Assembly.  Please be sure to deliver them ON TIME!  The school hosting state is not obligated to delay judging or the awards assembly if you are late turning entries in.  Please be respectful to them and to the students of your region.

Once the artwork is delivered to the state host and all non-advancing artwork is returned to the appropriate school, you are done. Sigh deeply and take a nap!

Tips to run Inspirations at the state level:

If possible, use the same committee (or at least one person from it) who ran Inspirations during your school level program.  They will already understand the program, the rules and the judging guidelines.  Just as at the school level, it will be helpful to have at least 3 people help with this level of the program.

The Inspirations Board has set a date for the State Awards Assembly.  We will get you contact information of representatives for each region as well as for each participating school.  As the state host it is your responsibility to communicate with all participating schools in your state regarding artwork collection and the awards night event.  Send this information first about a week before the Region Awards Assembly date.  Then send a reminder 2 weeks before the State Awards Assembly date.

Divide the categories up between committee members.  Each person should be very familiar with the rules of each category they are over.  By now, each entry should have been checked twice for rule compliance, so you should not have to do that again.  If you notice right off that an entry does not comply, please contact the head of the region it came from to find out why it was sent on. Please do not hesitate to contact the Inspirations Board if you have a question about an entry.

Set up a timeline that includes dates for the following items:

-         Date for artwork collection as determined by the State Inspirations Board.

-         Confirm judges

-         Judging completion.  If you choose to send entries home with your judges, they should only need a day or two to complete judging.

-         Date for winner name submissions to State Inspirations Board for trophy purchases.

-         Communication deadlines..

Find 2 judges for each category.  Judges need to be people with expertise in the specified category.  In order to maintain impartiality please find judges not associated with any school in your region.  Please do not re-use judges used at the region level programs.  Please be sure that student’s names are not visible during judging.  Students should not put their names on their artwork.  If they do then the names need to be covered prior to judging; however, the method of covering the name must not be permanent.  Follow tips found on the school level tips to find your judges.  Be sure to thank and recognize your judges.

The Awards Assembly should celebrate every entry.  Display entries by either category or school.  Have any electronic equipment needed for viewing of recorded entries.  (Musical Composition, Film/Video, Dance/Choreography.)  You can choose to ask students of 3D Art entries to bring the actual art work to the assembly to display.  You can choose to highlight a few of the performing arts entries as part of the program.  If you do this, be sure to involve multiple schools.  Each entry needs to receive a certificate of participation (First Place, Second Place, Honorable Mention, and High Honors).  Please see the certificate template section of the Inspirations blog for details.  The top two entries in each category and age division will receive trophies as part of the assembly.

In addition to the normal awards given, a tradition has started of awarding “Founders Choice” awards.  These will be awarded by the State Inspirations Board.  Please contact us to arrange a date and time before the assembly for us to come select those entries.

When the assembly is over, ask students to take home their entries and then ask a representative from each school to take back to their school any entries that are not collected by the student.  Have them take home any certificates and trophies of any student not present as well.  Arrange for the return of any entries & awards left at your school after the assembly within one week.

We understand that people’s lives are busy and that some may have to travel a good distance to attend the State Awards Assembly.  Expect to have parents or school administration ask you to release the names of winners head of time.  We have a strict policy that names are NOT given out before the assembly.  One major goal of the Inspirations program is to encourage our children to be creative and express themselves through the arts and then celebrate them when they do.  We want our awards assemblies to be about more than just who won.  Please remind your schools of this policy when you give them the deadline and assembly information.

Once all the artwork and awards are returned to the schools, you are done. Thank you so much for hosting. We hope it has been a good experience for you and appreciate your support of the Inspirations Art Program.