This past summer, Mia Chong graduated from the master’s program with a degree in arts administration and creative entrepreneurship. Amidst her celebrating this milestone came another milestone to celebrate: the beginning of the inaugural season her her dance company, EIGHT/MOVES. It was a full-circle moment; when Chong first enrolled in the program, one of the goals she had was to start a dance company. It felt like a continuation of the work she had done as a dancer, choreographer and director.

As for the program itself, it gave Chong the insight she needed to figure out important parts of her business. “I feel like I definitely learned a lot in the program, but especially in the experiential study, it was really nice to be able to have organized time to get some advice and mentoring on everything around what I wanted to do with my company, not just the materials that we had to or that I completed for the for the course.” Throughout the program, she worked closely with Mara Sidmore, visiting associate teaching professor of theatre, on what Chong described as “foundational admin work” like grant writing, event planning, and budgeting. The two worked together on grant applications for eight/moves.

“[Mara] really taught me a lot about being a really clear communicator… [in] the grant applications you have 100 characters to say everything you need to describe about this huge idea that you had. So she really helped me distill my ideas to their purest form.”

These applications can stretch for pages, asking about an organization’s mission, values and achievements. Chong wasn’t expecting to win any grants her first year. But to her surprise, eight/moves was awarded [name of grant] for $10,000. That grant helped her meet her budgetary goals, a feat for any new business.

The program also helped her with one of the biggest challenges for any non-profit: fundraising. “I learned a lot about fundraising…I learned a lot about organically cultivating relationships with donors and finding the style of fundraising that works for me. Because for a small dance company, we’re not selling a product. [Mara] really helped me get in touch with the idea of sharing an experience with people, which is a huge part of what my company is aiming to do. I had never thought about raising money in terms of also bolstering community, but that definitely made a huge difference with the way that I approached our first season of programming.”

Chong completed the program part-time while working as a dancer for companies located in San Francisco. The part-time structure — in addition to asynchronous classes — were a good fit for her. In addition to taking classes and working, she spent much of her time building the business plan for eight/moves. Despite the asynchronous schedule, she felt like she got to know her classmates, thanks to robust online discussions.

To learn more about EIGHT/MOVES, go to https://www.eightmoves.org/our-team