Understanding that stories from diverse perspectives enrich everyone’s lives, PEN/Faulkner cultivates a vibrant landscape for fiction readers and writers in DC and across the country. Working with local schools and educators, it brings writers from different backgrounds into classrooms for discussions, writing workshops, and semester- and year-long writing experiences. A fall salon spotlights emerging authors alongside established ones, while a partnership with the DC Public Library brings book club discussions, community workshops, and author conversations to the broader community. Every year, its four literary awards commend authors and literary advocates whose fiction creates empathy and advances civil discourse in America. PEN/Faulkner introduces over 4,500 youth and adults each year to a diverse breadth of fiction, inspires them to share their voices, builds community, and empowers them as readers and writers.

WISH LIST: $100: transcription services for a virtual program; $500: books for a full classroom; $1000: honoraria for authors involved in the fall Literary Salon

Congressional Chorus welcomes singers ages 8 to 98 into its multi-generational family, where they share their love of singing with the wider community. In schools where music programs have been cut, it offers students full scholarships to join a youth chorus, developing teamwork and fostering artistic excellence. Adults across the city audition for its hundred-strong choir that presents three major multidisciplinary concerts annually, including a musical cabaret. Seniors come together weekly in its Northeast Senior Singers group, one of the only local programs providing performance-centered experiences for older adults. Accessible transportation and enlarged lyric sheets allow all to participate, while a diverse range of presentation styles (from jazz to spoken word) appeals to many music lovers. At Congressional Chorus, one finds friends of different ages and backgrounds with whom to diversify and champion American music.

WISH LIST: $100: sheet music for 1 chorister for 2 concerts; $500: rehearsal space for 1 month for the American Youth Chorus; $1000: full scholarships for 3 adults

As the only professional theater organization in Tysons and the surrounding area, 1st Stage is a cultural hub for more than 15,000 people. Annually, artists from diverse backgrounds write and perform 165 dynamic modern plays about diverse social issues that spark important conversations. 1st Stage advances audience members’ connection with each other and the arts by facilitating pre- and post-show discussions and curating a rotating gallery of relevant local artwork. It also provides a space and platform for other grassroots community organizations and its paid fellowships allow emerging arts professionals to further their careers in artistic leadership, stage management, and more. By crafting family theater productions with early childhood developmental milestones in mind and offering all county high school students free season passes, 1st Stage connects people of all ages with the arts.

WISH LIST: $100: open captioning for 1 production; $500: 1 wireless over-ear microphone/bodypack; $1000: health insurance for 1 performer per production

A unique fusion of professional bilingual theater, youth development, and community development in Columbia Heights, GALA mounts a wide range of works by artists from Spain, Latin America, the Caribbean, and the US. These accessible performances engage some 20,000 audience members a year, including local pre-K to 12th-grade students. Through its year-round, award-winning arts education and training program, Paso Nuevo, Latinx youth explore their cultural identities in a safe and supportive environment. They work together on multi-arts performances that combine writing, acting, dance, and music while building theater, academic, and workforce skills. Some 85% of program graduates pursue college or land a job. Showcasing the breadth of Latino culture through the arts, GALA doesn’t just deepen cross-cultural understanding; it builds a thriving Latinx community, too.

WISH LIST: $100: tickets for a GALA production for a family of 4; $500: year-round Paso Nuevo program for 2 students; $1000: 1 actor for a GALita production

Despite its 2005 designation as an Arts & Entertainment District, Wheaton continued to lack public art spaces until Wheaton Arts Parade’s founding in 2017. It first brought art to Wheaton’s streets through an annual parade and festival, which has since grown to include over 2000 residents and 500 artists–initiating projects like Yarn Bomb that bring women together to crochet designs hung along the parade route. Throughout the year, professional and amateur artists incubate, show, and sell their work at the WAP Gallery, as well as host community events like artmaking, and puppet shows. WAP also commissions art projects like community mosaics and murals (now a defining town feature). Beyond activating Wheaton as an arts destination, WAP creates spaces for its diverse communities to celebrate Wheaton’s beauty in new ways.

WISH LIST: $200: supplies for a public art project; $500: honoraria for 7 performers at the annual festival; $1000: 5 community art-making workshops

Founded to bring high-quality arts education to everyone, ClancyWorks uses dance to advance positive social action. Its sought-after performances and choreographic collaborations explore social themes, reaching thousands of people across all ages and backgrounds nationwide. Most performances are free and accompanied by post-show dialogue sessions. Through its residencies in local schools, students learn that creative movement can help them solve conflicts, get better grades, develop leadership skills, and respond to global challenges. Senior communities across the region participate in workshops where they tell their personal stories, interpreting them creatively through movement. Additional intergenerational dance storytelling workshops give students and seniors spaces to connect and create together. Professional development training for artists and educators includes online programming on using the arts as a tool to deconstruct racism. At ClancyWorks, dance knows no boundaries.

WISH LIST: $100: supplies for 1 dance program; $500: racial equity-focused financial education program for 1 artist; $1000: Dance Educators Training Institute for 2 teachers

Few performing arts programs offer meaningful creative opportunities for adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD), including autism, and fewer still position them as artists and leaders. ArtStream’s six Inclusive Theatre Companies and Cabaret Company invite adults with disabilities to co-create original musical productions alongside professional Teaching Artists and trained Volunteer-Mentors. Participants collaborate on scripts, characters, music, and choreography, while building confidence and communication skills. Super Social Saturdays are theatre-based workshops designed to support social skill-building, confidence, and improvisational play. ArtStream’s work is grounded in participant choice, joy, and creative agency. Partnerships with libraries, service organizations, and local nonprofits ensure individuals with disabilities can access inclusive arts experiences that are meaningful, life-affirming, and transformational.

WISH LIST: $100: 1 hour class instruction by a Lead Teaching Artist; $500: costumes, props, set support for 2 performers during a production; $1730: 2 full participant scholarships

For many of the 500+ young artists who train with YAA each year, stepping on stage alongside hundreds of other student performers is a large-scale performance experience that grows their lifelong confidence and love for the arts. Across the year, talented students from all backgrounds in grades 3-12 come together to learn and perform musical theatre, voice, acting, and more. After school and during intensive summer camps, they hone their individual talents while practicing collaboration with their peers and YAA partners. This rigorous training pays off: nationally-known artists mentor students and teach masterclasses; students perform regularly at state-of-the-art venues; and YAA’s original work is both award-winning and renowned. Scholarships, free classes in community spaces, and free concerts ensure that every young person can immerse themselves in the arts and use them to explore socially relevant themes.

WISH LIST: $100: musical score/script & costume for 1 student; $500: orchestra program for 1 student; $1000: participation in the musical theatre program for 1 student

WMF uses evidence-based music therapy to reduce the risk of suicide for active-duty military, veterans, and their dependents. Music therapists design treatment programs for each individual, drawing from across WMF’s six key programs. Through private music lessons, group therapy sessions, drumming circles, and cohort recital performances, veteran students practice regulating their mood and relaxing. Musical improvisation and songwriting give them space to express themselves while connecting with others to reduce social isolation. During quarterly songwriting retreats, students write songs that tell their deeply personal stories of trauma, grief, and loss. Many write for their children, spouses, and friends. The positive impacts are profound and award-winning: music therapy decreases students’ anxiety, improves sleep, imparts coping skills, and reduces suicidal symptoms. For many students skeptical of therapy, WMF empowers them to pursue mental health support.

WISH LIST: $100: weeks of music lessons for 1 service member; $500: 12 weeks of music therapy for a service member; $5000: entire Songwriting Retreat weekend

Reflecting the diverse mosaic of people and cultures that make up DC, Mosaic Theater Company promotes open dialogue and produces culturally diverse theater experiences to illuminate critical social issues. Season productions are accompanied by year-round reflections that include panels and community walking tours, as well as intergenerational matinees that welcome students and seniors with free tickets and transportation. A playwriting contest encourages high school students to write and submit original plays, engaging professional actors to stage public readings of the three winning entries. Mosaic also invests in artists by commissioning new plays and hosting artist-in-residence programs. Connecting 15,000 audience members annually with stories often unseen on stage, it presents diverse social justice perspectives and spurs civic discourse. At Mosaic, artistic work and community engagement go hand-in-hand.

WISH LIST: $100: intergenerational matinee & transportation for 1 high school student; $250: video workshop for the High School Playwriting Contest; $1000: wardrobe for 1 actor

WISH LIST: $100: week stipend for a young person in the Youth Organizing Collective; $500: DSLR camera and supplies; $1000: Giving Photography Society membership