Greg Dole, MFA in Arts Leadership class of 2012, has been named Grants Director and Community Development Director at the Arts Council of Greater Baton Rouge. He manages outreach, technical assistance, and the application and review process for the council’s grants programs. The agency distributes approximately $250,000 annually to arts organizations in an 11–parish region.
 
Dole, who received his undergraduate degree in landscape architecture with a minor in art history from Louisiana State University, spent several years in the Seattle area, mainly in the for-profit sector. He returned to Louisiana in 2001 and, after hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, relocated back to the Puget Sound area to work with nonprofits.
 
“I realized that working in the nonprofit sector was where I wanted to be,” he said from his Baton Rouge office. “Getting the MFA in Arts Leadership combined my interest in nonprofit work with my interest in the arts.”
 
Dole did MFA practicums at the Bellevue Arts Museum and Photographic Center Northwest where he focused on fundraising and development. While still a graduate student, he was tapped to be the lead visual arts panelist for group project grants for 4Culture. 4Culture provides support for arts and cultural activities in King County. In his role on the grants panel, he reviewed applications and helped to determine which organizations should get funding.
 
Returning to Louisiana after graduation and joining the Arts Council in Baton Rouge, Dole put his MFA to work immediately; he distributed $80,000 in grants during his first two weeks on the job. He has also been providing technical assistance to organizations on how to write grants and how to comply with grant requirements.
 
“My experiences with fundraising and grantmaking, from writing grants to evaluating and distributing grants, gave me the skills I need to do my job well,” he said. “It was easy to step right in.”

The College of Arts and Sciences, the largest college in Seattle University, offers 42 undergraduate majors, 37 minors, and 7 master's degrees. The MFA in Arts Leadership is a full member program in the Association of Arts Administration Educators.