Partnership with the France-Merrick Foundation has been particularly critical to the success of MICA's Community Arts Partnership (CAP), through which students take the lead on projects that uplift low-income communities and inner-city youth through arts-related civic leadership - using art therapy to comfort ailing hospital patients, raising issues of homelessness through exhibitions, and teaching art to elementary school students. Exceptional CAP students are selected as France-Merrick fellows and given a grant to design and pursue a "dream" project. "We wanted to build upon and help facilitate MICA's involvement in the community," says Wally Pinkard, president of the France-Merrick Foundation. "MICA's culture matches very well with our priorities related to encouraging higher education to play a more significant role in that area."

Sarah Wren '10 looked at Pratt Institute and the School of the Arts Institute of Chicago, but came to MICA in large part because of the CAP program. "It was a perfect way for me to use art as a connection to others," she said. After being selected as a 2009-2010 France-Merrick Fellow, she partnered with the Boys and Girls Club to empower teenage girls through fashion design that would boost their self-confidence and sense of pride. Under Wren's tutelage, the young women learned to design and create clothing, and then produced a fashion show for parents and friends.

"I loved being able to use art to change perspectives," Wren explained. "For example, one of my girls was never ready for a session to be over. When the mother showed up, she was negative and unimpressed with her daughter's burning desire to crochet or sew, commenting that such activities were a ‘waste of time'. However, at the end of the year, this same mother approached me and admitted how impressed she was that they pulled it together, and asked if I would be back next year so they could put on another one."

Wren's experience is exactly the kind of success the France-Merrick Foundation had in mind when it partnered with MICA. "Many kids don't have the advantage of access to the arts," says Pinkard. "I think that one of the best aspects of MICA's program has been providing role models who are talented, young, and motivated. What's really great about what Sarah has done is that kids can see it: Through art, there is a visual outcome."