An award-winning industrial designer and innovator who founded Publicolor, a long-term youth development program, to educate disadvantaged youth and prepare them for jobs: publicolor.org.

Ruth.jpg

Ruth Lande Shuman

<h4 style="text-align: center">
 AN ART ESSAY &amp; INTERVIEW
</h4>

 Volunteers are the lifeblood of Publicolor. In 2000 we won one of our
 country’s highest honors, the President’s Service Award, from
 President Clinton for our work with volunteers in the community.


 Every year over 1000 volunteers join us as painters on Saturdays in
 under-resourced schools and community sites. We transform these sites
 through warm color and thoughtful design. Publicolor paints dignity,
 respect, inspiration and safety in low-income neighborhoods.


 Corporations love to send their employees to paint alongside our
 students as they see this as a great team-building opportunity. It’s
 also a special way for corporate employees to participate in their
 company’s philanthropy. Publicolor students consistently mention
 Saturdays as their favorite part of Publicolor, citing getting to meet
 new people as most special. They cherish learning about new job
 options and what it takes to succeed. Publicolor’s volunteers are
 treasured role models!


 <img class="lazyload w-100 h-auto"
 src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/publicolor2_a4d5c84881.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-05T07:44:56.128Z"
 alt="publicolor2" />


 <img class="lazyload w-100 h-auto"
 src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/publicolor3_0f88c82378.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-05T07:45:48.000Z"
 alt="publicolor3" />


 Academic tutors also join us as volunteer leaders of our weekly
 career exposure workshops, and as mentors for our high school seniors
 and college freshmen. With the help of our volunteer painters,
 Publicolor has transformed about 500 sites. With the help of our
 tutors, 85% of Publicolor students enter college not needing
 remediation versus 19% of their school peers. Thanks to our mentors,
 98% have stayed in college after their freshman year versus 66% at the
 City University of New York. Since most of Publicolor students are the
 first in their family to go to college, the encouragement and guidance
 they receive from our volunteers is invaluable.


 For all these reasons, Publicolor treasures our volunteers. We
 couldn’t do what we do without them!

<h3 style="text-align: center">
 Interview with Ruth Lande Shuman, founder of Publicolor
</h3>

 
 Q: Please share with us the mission of Publicolor.


 RLS: The mission of Publicolor is to
 creatively engage high risk, low-income students in their education and
 prepare them to be productive in the workplace.


 Q: How did the organization form?


 RLS:&nbsp;I was very concerned back
 in the late ’80s about the rising dropout rate. All I could think of was
 the horrible impact that would be on the future of our economy. In
 another life I had helped develop the Big Apple Circus and was a
 founding board member. I got to see a lot of schools that had our arts
 and education program, and many of them were in east Harlem. All of them
 looked and felt like prisons.


 I thought to myself: It’s no wonder that kids are dropping out; it’s no
 wonder that parents aren’t showing up for parent teacher conferences; I
 wouldn’t go to such a hostile environment. And it’s no wonder teachers
 are burning out. That was the lightbulb moment!


 <img class="lazyload w-100 h-auto"
 src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/publicolor4_d26c9bb1c0.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-05T07:46:24.411Z"
 alt="publicolor4" />


 At the same time I had just finished a masters in industrial design at
 Pratt with a specialty in the psychological effects of color. Color has
 a huge effect on our attitudes and behaviour. So I thought about putting
 a paintbrush in the hands of disaffected students – the ones who are at
 high risk of dropping out. I wanted to teach them the marketable skill
 of commercial painting, and teach them strong and transferable work
 habits. And along the way, they would develop a sense of pride and
 ownership of their school, and start attending school more regularly.
 Also, if they spend any time with me, they’ll get to understand the
 importance of education and how that’s going to be their path out of
 poverty.


 So I mentioned the idea to the woman who ran the circus’ arts and
 education program. She also ran an educational complex in East Harlem,
 and she said to me, “Come on in. I want you to paint my whole school.”
 It was a city square block school of five storeys. The project was a
 huge success. Estee Lauder had wanted to do something in that school and
 the principal suggested that they meet with me. They loved the idea and
 they volunteered. We did a lot of prepping with the kids during the week
 and on weekends. We primed all the hallways, all the stairwells, and
 then drew thousands of linesm because I had a rather complicated design.
 Literally, within one day, from Estee Lauder, my friends, the teachers
 and the principal, we had 350 volunteers and we painted all the public
 spaces of the school.&nbsp;It was rather extraordinary.


 <img class="lazyload w-100 h-auto"
 src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/publicolor5_6302b79294.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-05T07:47:00.971Z"
 alt="publicolor5" />


<hr class="vertical-space1" />


 Then the school’s Chancellor came by and pulled me aside and said, “This
 is a catalyst for change. I want you in my schools. I’ll send out an RFP
 for a school beautification program.” So I filled out the application
 with the Department of Education and we won the contract. I took a
 little time off to set us up as a non profit organization, and then we
 were!


 Then I met with the Deputy Chancellor for Operations who asked me which
 school did I want, and I told him I wanted his lowest performing school.
 In the contract I was very specific that I wanted their lowest
 performing schools. That’s how it got started.


 <img class="lazyload w-100 h-auto"
 src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/publicolor6_dbcb775d4d.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-05T07:47:39.957Z"
 alt="publicolor6" />


 Q: That’s a beautiful story. What were some of the reactions after
 these drastic changes to the schools?


 RLS:&nbsp;There was one father who
 said that it was as if Santa Claus had come and left this gift. It was
 just so gorgeous. He said something about Santa and his elves, because
 when he arrived on Monday to drop his son, he couldn’t believe what he
 saw. The whole school was completely transformed. The kids love it.


 I have learned – and at first it hurt my feelings – that change is very
 difficult for many people. For some, their initial reaction was not
 fantastic. But what I have understood is to give them two weeks to
 adjust, and almost everybody ends up loving the change. And there are
 always going to be a few who don’t like yellow, or don’t like the blue
 that I chose for the doors. In the end, if we’ve used any color that the
 kids and the principal don’t particularly like, then we change it.


 <img class="lazyload w-100 h-auto"
 src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/publicolor7_78af02b117.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-05T07:48:27.019Z"
 alt="publicolor7" />


 Q: Is there a student who stood out as being especially enabled by
 the transformation or the mentoring program?


 RLS:&nbsp;Oh, that’s hard, as there
 are so many. One comes to mind. One of my students is a girl called
 Cecile, whose mother was very, very sick when she joined our continuum
 program. She claims it was because of us that she stayed in school and
 didn’t drop out, and she really didn’t want to drop out. She went on to
 college and said that she would have dropped out again after her first
 year because her mother was so sick. But we gave her a lot of support
 and explained why college was so important for her and how it would make
 her mother proud. Her mother passed away after her sophomore year, and
 she had a mentor who encouraged her to stay in school. She went to one
 of the top culinary schools in the country and she now has a job working
 in food services for Google. She also works for us on Saturdays as a
 site staff member.


 <img class="lazyload w-100 h-auto"
 src="https://cdn-prod-static.heartfulness.org/publicolor8_74de447413.jpg?updated_at=2023-04-05T07:49:06.856Z"
 alt="publicolor8" />


 There’s just one more thing: I remember once we replicated in Pittsburgh
 and there was a guy at Carnegie who did a study on volunteerism and
 wrote a piece about Publicolor. What he and I uncovered is just how much
 better an employee feels about their company after they’ve participated
 in a volunteer program. They take great pride in the fact that their
 company is volunteering to help X, Y or Z. What we’ve noticed apart from
 the pride factor is also the magnificent team building opportunity. We
 have a lot of feedback about that from volunteers.


 Q: Thank you so much for your time.


 RLS:&nbsp;Thank you, my pleasure.

<hr />
<h4 style="text-align: center">
 Art Essay by PUBLICOLOR 
 Interview by EMMA IVATURI
</h4>
<hr />

Ruth Lande Shuman

An award-winning industrial designer and innovator who founded Publicolor, a long-term youth development program, to educate disadvantaged youth and prepare them for jobs: publicolor.org.

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