By Michael Spicer, Executive Director
You probably already imagine that it takes a lot of donations for SCT to continue to provide the art that we do for so many children and adults. This year that amount lives a little north of $153,000. However, SCT is lucky. We are able to earn 75% of what it takes to keep operations going, a percentage higher than any other non-profit in the region, and 15% higher than the national average for theatres.
But did you know that Salina Community Theatre also gives back to the community as well? Every year we receive so many requests from other organizations looking for tickets that they can raffle off, or give away as prizes, or use to send their supporters a special thank you. Each season, we give more than $5000 in tickets to assist other organizations.
We also regularly invite Ashby House, CAPS, and other organization to bring their residents and participants to see shows when the subject matter is appropriate.
Every time we do a Center for Theatre Arts show, we ask for $5.00 per student to cover a portion of the production costs, but we also make sure that the teachers understand two things: 1. If the student doesn’t have the $5.00, please bring them anyway, and 2. (because you know they will) we tell the teachers not to put their own money in for the students.
Finally, 25% of our CTA students receive some level of scholarship. In return, we ask them to do tasks to help the theatre, such as delivering posters or tabbing and folding our SPOTLIGHT mailings.
In these ways, we continue to accomplish our mission that “No child is turned away because of an inability to pay.”
By the end of production year 2017, SCT will have donated more than $12,000 back to the community. We realized long ago that generosity is a two-way street. As Mark Twain said, “To get the full measure of joy, you must have someone to divide it with.” We have always tried to put at least a little joy into a lot of hearts.
