The Network Effect of Arts Incubators A Geospatial Perspective: A Geospatial Perspective

Although there has been a proliferation of metrics to evaluate arts incubators, the academic field is still developing. Different models and methods of education are applied to the complex phenomena of arts incubators; therefore, it is crucial to measure the effectiveness of education programs from many different perspectives. Our aim is to propose a metric that can estimate the effect of each incubator activity based on the geospatial distribution of its participants. This GIS-based metric will provide a descriptive measure for the quantity and density of the geographical communities affected by the incubator’s activity as well as socioeconomic and demographic benchmarks. Our study investigates fourteen US-based arts incubators that offer entrepreneurial training to their associated 1,087 incubatees. The goal of this study is to provide a metric that can assist arts incubators, program directors, arts administrators, and university programs in assessing program growth and funding and marketing efforts.