Hello! My name is Maeve Scully and I am a rising senior at The Ohio State University. During my fellowship with the Columbus Foundation, my host site and base is the nonprofit Cartoon Crossroads Columbus (CXC).  Cartoon Crossroads is a fairly new organization, as they are planning on hosting their fourth festival this coming fall. The CXC festival is an annual event that aims to highlight the importance and relevance of comics, art and animation while concurrently suggesting the relevance of Columbus as a hotspot for both established and up-and-coming artists.

My first week with CXC has been a whirlwind. The announcement party for the festival—one of the most important events aside from the festival itself—was on Wednesday. The event allowed for me to get to know some of the most integral members of CXC and learn a lot about the history behind the nonprofit. I’m so thrilled to be a part of an organization so passionate about art in Columbus and the announcement party really prepared me to speak out about CXC and the work they do. When I wasn’t preparing for the event, I was working with the nonprofit to examine their previous surveys in order to better them. This will be one of my main projects for the summer, as CXC is looking for someone to better their communication and outreach and surveys provide great insight into how that can be bettered. Along with that, I will have the opportunity to work on some marketing for the festival itself, so I spent some time this week working with my supervisors to determine their target audience and outreach strategy. With the new information, I will continue to research the best marketing points for their target demographics as well as Columbus locals.

It was a busy first week with the Columbus Foundation and CXC, but a very promising one. I can’t wait to see what impact I can make during this fellowship.

CXC pins from the announcement party