Alisa Moldavanova, associate professor and Master of Public Administration (MPA) program director at the Joseph R. Biden School of Public Policy and Administration, received one of 1,288 first-round grants nationwide from the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) for 2024. Announced by NEA on January 24, 2024, the $35,000 award is part of $32,223,055 in grants awarded nationwide.​

Moldavanova’s grant will fund the research project “From Decline to Prosperity: Examining the Role of a Vibrant Arts Sector in Supporting Rural Sustainability.”

The study seeks to equip rural community stakeholders with the tools and knowledge necessary to leverage their arts and culture assets for community sustainability. ​

“There is a crucial need to investigate the role of a vibrant cultural sector in rural communities and whether the sector makes a difference in helping these communities turn from decline to sustainability,” Moldavanova says.​​​

“In the absence of such knowledge, local policymakers, donors, and cultural organizations themselves have limited capacity to design and support effective intervention strategies that would allow leveraging the creative sector’s capacity to make a difference in rural contexts,” she added. ​

Her broader research program investigates how nonprofits and other public service organizations foster sustainable development in their local communities. She also studies organizational sustainability in the context of public service organizations, inter-organizational networks, and other forms of social connectedness in enabling sustainable organizations.​

Moldavanova was an NEA research grant recipient in 2016 and again in 2019. Her previous NEA-funded work was published in the Journal of Urban Affairs (JUA).

“From Decline to Prosperity” runs from January 1, 2024, until January 1, 2026. For more information, please visit the NEA website.