At the National Council on the Arts meeting on October 29 the NEA previewed changes to the FY 2012 NEA Grants for Arts Projects application guidelines. The changes will officially be posted in January 2011.

Highlights of the changes detailed by the NEA include:

• The Access to Artistic Excellence and Learning in the Arts for Children and Youth categories have been replaced with a new funding category called Art Works, which will embody the agency's guiding principle: "Art works."
• Art Works will support the four outcomes mandated by the Agency's 2010 Strategic Plan:

- Creation: The creation of art that meets the highest standards of excellence,
- Engagement: Public engagement with diverse and excellent art,
- Learning: Lifelong learning in the arts, and
- Livability: The strengthening of communities through the arts.

You will be asked to select the outcome that is most relevant to your project and that reflects the results expected to be achieved by your project. If you receive a grant, you will also be asked to provide evidence that the outcome was achieved.

• Within these outcomes, innovative projects are encouraged. To ensure that innovative ideas and formats for artistic expression are supported, the NEA is requiring that Consortium applications be for innovative projects. In general, innovative projects are characterized as those that may prove transformative with the potential for meaningful change; are distinctive by offering fresh insights and new value for the field and/or the public through unconventional solutions; and may be shared and/or emulated, or lead to other innovations.

If you have been applying to Access to Artistic Excellence, you will now apply to Art Works, and if you have been applying to Learning in the Arts for Children and Youth, you will now apply to Art Works through the Arts Education discipline.

The PAA will continue to update you on these impending changes and will alert members when the changes are officially released in January 2011.