Episode 5: Ben Lamb - 1Berkshire

by Lisa Donovan

Today’s episode is hosted by Lisa Donovan, Ph.D., a professor in the Fine & Performing Arts Department at the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts. In this episode of Thinking Like a Region, Donovan interviews Ben Lamb, Director of Economic Development at 1Berkshire. Donovan and Lamb discuss the role of the arts in economic development, Lamb’s history as a student at MCLA, and projects he has been a part of across Berkshire County.

Lamb shares his insights on the importance of exposing our youth to the arts, the skills employers are looking for, and how the arts can develop these skills and capacities including community engagement and working collaboratively.  Listen in to hear how Lamb works to serve the arts programs across the region.

You can find the transcript for this episode here: https://tinyurl.com/benTLAR

Thinking Like A Region is a production of the C4 Initiative, Berkshire County’s Creative Compact for Collaborative and Collective Impact, based at Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts in North Adams, MA, and grant-funded by the National Endowment for the Arts. This podcast is produced by Lisa Donovan and Leslie Appleget. Additional technical support by Audrey Perdue.

For more information about the show or the C4 Initiative, visit brainworks.mcla.edu/c4.

THIS EPISODE’S VOICES:

Ben Lamb is the Director of Economic Development at 1Berkshire. Lamb’s work focuses on what he calls ‘wraparound economic development,’ which creates connective tissue between traditional and non-traditional participants in the region’s economic ecosystem — most notably through his development and launch of the Berkshire Blueprint 2.0, an economic-development imperative for the region’s next decade.

Lisa Donovan, Ph.D. is a Professor in the Fine and Performing Arts Department at the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts. Previously, she served as Lesley University’s Director of the Creative Arts in the Learning Division. Dr. Donovan has published widely and presented across the country and internationally on arts integration, rural arts education, and arts integration assessment. She is co-director of BRAINworks and the Director of the Institute for the Arts and Humanities. She is the 2021 Recipient of the Massachusetts Arts|Learning Irene Buck Service to Arts Education Award.