Old Schoolhouse Magazine

The Lit, the literary arts organization in Cleveland, has a new interim ...

The Lit, Cleveland's only nonprofit organization dedicated to the literary arts, has a new interim director.

Kelly Bird, an arts-marketing consultant, replaces Judith Mansour, who left The Lit to become chief of staff and special assistant to Jerry Sue Thornton, president of Cuyahoga Community College.

Bird is not new to The Lit. Shortly after Mansour became director four years ago, she brought in Bird as a consultant. Bird helped rebrand the organization after its name change -- it had been the Poets and Writers League of Greater Cleveland -- and did some marketing of its classes and events.

Bird takes over as The Lit, like most arts organizations, faces financial challenges. Even though membership has grown, from about 250 to more than 500, funding and grants from foundations have dropped off, Mansour said.

In response, Mansour and the board cut the annual operating budget from $148,000 to about $90,000, according to board President Lori Compton.

"It's been a very, very tough year," Compton said.

The most drastic cut was to Mansour's own position, which went from full to part time in October. The Lit also moved its operations from a loft space in the ArtCraft Building on Superior Avenue, where large events could be held, to office space in the Old Schoolhouse on Murray Hill Road in Cleveland's Little Italy neighborhood.

Its quarterly publication, The Muse, went from a gorgeous print magazine to online only. The cuts extended to signing on with the free phone service offered by Google.

Bird, who has a 2-year-old son, is happy with the part-time hours. Before she became a consultant, Bird had been vice president of marketing for the Cleveland Institute of Art and director of marketing and external relations for the Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland.

Planning my Days with The Old SchoolHouse Magazine Planner {Review ...

I have spent the last three weeks pouring over this amazing planner and truly cannot wrap my mind  around the immensity of information, planning and activities made available in this amazing 800+ page planner!  The price for the downloadable eBook version of the 2011-2012 Schoolhouse Planner  is:  $39.00.  However, if you prefer to receive the Planner on CD , it can be yours for:  $44.00

As I sat down with the planner (my DH printed most of it for me…I’m an old fashioned pen/paper kind of girl…)  I really wanted to find a way to integrate the planner into our lives.  Not just for homeschool, but for day to day life.  I wanted to truly take advantage of every sweet morsel…  I did, however, travel back to my computer, as I found links throughout the planner that provided free ‘gems’….that I could not wait to read!

So, I took out my Binder and made a few adjustments:

Added the new calendars.  Behind each month, I identified various Informational Must Know Lists.  We are studying American history next year.  So, I found all of the lists about American Wars, Presidents, Branches of Federal, State and Local Govt, States and Capitals, etc.  Those lists will move behind each month through the entire year.  That will allow us the opportunity to review/learn, create lapbooks, notebook and drill a little I added other lists behind other months…that won’t necessarily ‘travel’ with us through the year, but will give us an opportunity to increase our knowledge and learn about other things that peak our interests….like Modern Art Movements, Famous Composers, The ABCs of Landforms At the beginning of my ‘calendar’ tab, I added the quick glance list at each month for important dates…and my own Bucket List (I loved that movie and have so many things I would like to experience with my family…it’s time to start that list and keep track of the items we do together!) If my children were in highschool, this planner would be the one I would want.  It has great forms for transcripts, planning and hours!  A definite must-have when preparing children for their college years!

Added new Biblical Information to my Spiritual tab:  new reading plans for the children (along with some notebooking pages for them to use during their devotional time), as well as some great lists about Jesus:  His miracles, Parables and more!