As funding for art, music, and theater programs is stripped away from public schools, Athens-based social entrepreneurship, umano, fights for art education.
Each T-shirt that umano sells results in the donation of a backpack full of art supplies to children in schools where they may otherwise not have significant art education.
Social entrepreneurship is defined as “inspired pragmatism,” according to a 2006 article in The Observer. Rather than hoping the world might get better or giving money to nonprofits working for change, social entrepreneurship companies tie each product sold to action allowing the do-good aspects of the company to grow as sales increase.
umano’s CEO Alex Torrey told Refinery29 IN WHAT YEAR? that with umano, “you don’t have to choose between doing well and doing good.”
Doing well in the world of fashion looks like wearing clothing that is both cool and comfortable. umano’s custom fabric, called omobono, is described on the company’s website as “freakishly-soft.” omobono is made from a thick polyurethan NOT POLYURETHANE? JUST CHECKING material from Turkey.
umano’s modern-style shirts featuring simple drawings from children are most commonly printed on black, white, and gray T-shirts, and prices start at $36.
For umano, “choosing good,” kids’ artwork, is crucial to their mission.
Alex Torrey on Twitter: “”art education is not about learning to draw, it’s about learning to see.” read why we support art ed on the blog. https://t.co/r1xjgkKpCS pic.twitter.com/pAcbfzmNMx / Twitter”
“art education is not about learning to draw, it’s about learning to see.” read why we support art ed on the blog. https://t.co/r1xjgkKpCS pic.twitter.com/pAcbfzmNMx
The clothing company is not alone in this idea that choosing art is important. Research out of the National Endowment for the Arts found that among low socioeconomic status students, “high levels of art engagement from kindergarten through elementary school showed high test scores in science and writing.”
Despite this 2012 research from the NEA, when schools face budget deficits, art programs are often cut.
USA Today’s Tamara Henry looked at how art in its various forms specifically benefits students and found that visual arts “improve content and organization of writing” as well as benefiting “reasoning about scientific images and reading readiness.” Henry’s research from 2002 supports umano’s ideas about art education though scientific support.
Beyond the classroom, involving kids in the process of following a prompt and drawing what comes to mind, allows umano to “empower them and to show they can create things of tremendous value,” as co-owner Jonathan Torrey told The Red and Black in 2015.