Spend six weeks during the summer gaining full-time hands-on professional experience in the arts. This program offers several project options and is open to undergraduate students at Duke.
Arts + is a six-week summer experience for undergraduate students grounded in the arts. An initiative of Duke Arts, Arts + sheds light on the behind-the-scenes work of arts administration, and the creative work required to build an artistic product. Teams work in small groups of undergraduate students, guided by a project lead from the Duke Arts office, Trinity Faculty, or a community arts organization. Other participation benefits may include professional practice education, hands-on skills building workshops and team building activities. Outcomes of Arts + may include season launches, series curation or preparing creative projects for next stages.
Arts + is open to all undergraduate students (except graduating seniors). Students must be able to work in-person for the duration of the program and should be able to make a full-time commitment for the six weeks.
For summer of 2025, Arts+ students can participate in one of three programs: Resilience through Puppetry, Duke Arts Fellows, and the Duke Arts Presents Admin Team. Full program descriptions are below.
Arts + takes place during Summer Session 1 (May 14–June 23). Students will receive a stipend of $3,500 for their participation OR room and board in on-campus housing.
Applications for summer 2025 closed on February 24.
(Team of 3 Students)
Team Lead: Torry Bend, Director of Undergraduate Studies and Professor of the Practice of Theater Studies
The Resilience through Puppetry Arts + team will live at the Duke University Marine Lab (DUML) developing and running middle school camps that use puppetry to teach resilience. In collaboration with faculty from DUML and Trinity, Arts + students will run programs that allow us to test the efficacy of puppetry as a tool for teaching resilience. Students will develop camp curriculum with the larger team over two weeks, run three separate weeklong camps, and evaluate the effectiveness of the camp curriculum in the concluding week. We seek students interested in middle school education with experience in the arts (no puppetry experience necessary).
Please note: The DUML team will only have the housing option available, as they will be based at the marine lab, and no stipend will be provided for this team.
(Team of 3 Students)
Team Lead: Anna Wallace, Duke Arts Student Engagement Manager
Duke Arts Fellows is an academic year program that will connect Duke undergraduates with Durham Public Schools educators and Duke faculty mentors. The program seeks to bolster arts education offerings in public schools while providing Duke students with 1:1 Duke arts faculty mentorship. Within the DPS system, Duke students will leverage their expertise, background in the arts, and Duke’s resources to cultivate meaningful arts programming. For the ‘25-’26 year, mentors will include Michael Klien, Allan Friedman, Torry Bend, JP Gritton, and Raquel Salvatella de Prada.
This summer’s cohort will continue work begun during Arts+ last summer and during the past academic year by the Duke Arts Fellows Student Advisory Board. The summer ’25 team will complete the necessary preparations for the full program launch during the 2025-26 academic year. The team will be responsible for creating the schedule, structure, and expectations for all members of the Duke Arts Fellows program, including undergraduate students, Duke faculty mentors, and DPS educators. Participation on this team will provide students an opportunity to gain valuable project management, research, and assessment skills related to arts administration and public education.
(Team of 3 Students)
Team Leads: Frances Howorth, Duke Arts Director of Marketing and Communications and Aaron Shackelford, Duke Arts Director of Programming
The Duke Arts Presents Admin Team will integrate into the programming, production, marketing and communications teams at Duke Arts, gaining hands-on experience running an outdoor concert series while launching the upcoming 2025-26 Duke Arts Presents season. Members of this Arts + team will gain insights into the field of arts administration while developing tactical, resume-building industry skills.
On concert dates (every Wednesday in June, and the final Wednesday in May), the team will work closely with programming and production to support the needs of the artists and ensure a successful concert series. The team will also work with programming to identify artists for an upcoming festival. Roles with Marketing and Communications will include preparing event descriptions, building web pages, and developing marketing plans for the upcoming season; brainstorming community outreach strategies for individual events; and building accessibility resources and communications around Duke Arts Presents venues and events.
Over six weeks, this team played a key role in launching the 2024-25 season and supporting our summer concert series, Music in the Gardens. From researching artists and building event pages to brainstorming community outreach, they gained transferrable, resume-building professional skills.
When 9-year-old John Brown saw the North Carolina Symphony perform at his elementary school in Fayetteville, North Carolina, he was inspired to start playing the bass. Brown had seen the …
Duke Arts is excited to introduce the three teams for the 2025 Arts+ program, a summer experiential learning initiative now in its second year. This multifaceted program offers opportunities for …
Over the summer, Duke Arts launched Arts+, a six-week program for Duke students to explore arts administration and arts research/practice. Arts+ joins other (+) programs across Duke offering funded experiential education …
Summer 2024 students making zines
Summer 2024 students making puppets in a puppet workshop
Summer 2024 students participating in a movement workshop