Last year, Tracy Wilkes stepped down as the executive director of DREAMS of Wilmington, a youth development organization providing visual and performance arts programs to at-risk youth aged 8-18 years old. During her 18-year stint, Wilkes watched the program’s facilities expand from just a garage at Rippy Auto World to four rooms in the back of the Children’s Museum of Wilmington with just four teachers to what it is today – its own, still-expanding space at 901 Fanning St.

With her departure, she hoped to leave the nonprofit in the hands of someone looking to expand DREAMS’ outreach and drive energy into its programs.

She found that person in Matt Carvin.
 

Early influences

Carvin’s love for music began at an early age. He started lessons around the age of 11 years old. His father played folk music as a guitarist.

After he learned a couple of chords, and because guitar is “the coolest instrument in the world,” as Carvin says, it didn’t take long for him to fall in love with it. His interest in music became more serious in college as he majored in it, eventually receiving a master’s in music performance from the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore and a master’s in arts administration focused in nonprofit management from American University in Washington, D.C.

By the time Carvin began pursuing his second master’s degree, he had already begun his own nonprofit called Creative Access.

Founded in 1857, the Peabody Conservatory is the oldest conservatory in the country. Despite its national recognition, it did not have a community outreach program, and that need sparked Carvin’s interest in the nonprofit field.

“[The lack of programs] perpetuated this idea of classical music being ‘the ivory tower of music’, being unapproachable,” Carvin said. “Its location in the heart of Baltimore creates this vibe of all these conservatory students with not a lot of diversity that don’t ever leave their ivory towers.”

Carvin began volunteering around the community by playing shows. While altruistic, he simply needed play in front of people.

The group played at senior centers, after-school programs and hospices.

“We did a lot of health care [shows], just changing very sterile environments,” Carvin said, “changing the ambiance of the room and hallway from just sterile beeps to having beautiful music that really sooths people during their time of healing.”

Creative Access eventually tapped the Maryland Institute College of Art to bring in visual components to the performances as well. It became the largest volunteer student music outreach program in the country.

“The easy part was the program- and mission-related stuff,” Carvin said. “It would really fill your soul up every time you got out there and saw firsthand what impacts you were making in the community.”

Though Carvin enjoyed his time with Creative Access, he believed his talents needed to be used elsewhere.
 

Goals in Wilmington

“All leadership really has an expiration date. I’d been there for 10 years, and I was feeling a little burnout creeping up,” Carvin said. “It was great opportunity to put some feelers out there, when I came across this wonderful organization that did work like nothing I had ever seen before with use of multidisciplinary arts that reached so many different barriers of poverty.”

Referring to DREAMS as “the most awesome organization in the world,” Carvin seemed to find his niche at the community outreach organization.

DREAMS started in 1996 with the goal of providing students the opportunity to explore visual, performance, musical and other creative art programs free of charge. Through funding and volunteer efforts, the program has expanded substantially over the years.

DREAMS now serves over 800 at-risk youth, offers more than 60 classes per week and runs 15 different sites in Wilmington.
 

The teaching artists span a variety of experience.

DREAMS includes classes in everything from ballet, painting and pottery to furniture upcycling and design, metalsmithing and dance fusion.

“We give them this cornucopia of programming options and things to explore. It really unites the creativity of the students and empowers them in a youth development capacity way,” Carvin said. “It changes their lives honestly. I see it every day.”

DREAMS includes both artistic programs and community outreach programs because not all students will be able to attend DREAMS. In fact, it has a waiting list.

To make sure the group reach as many students as possible, it moved one location to the Northside of Wilmington four years ago. DREAMS often sends teaching artists to community centers and schools to teach a class or two as well.

There are just under 100 kids in the program taking four classes each week. The group serves anywhere between 200 to 400 kids at outreach sites as well. To meet such demand, the organization just opened the second half of the DREAM Center called “Phase Two – The Garage at DREAMS”.

The organization relocated to a building that served as a bus repair garage in 1939 for New Hanover County. Now the organization has a brand new, 5,000-square-foot performing arts center fixed to the building with curtains, a new stage and a sound system, bringing authenticity to the students’ works. In addition, the DREAMS performing arts center is open to the community.

“We want to transform the community, transform the Northside, transform the interpretations of the families, and by bringing folks into DREAMS in this new center,” Carvin said.

Looking into the next five years, Carvin hopes to expand the program within Wilmington and maybe bring it to nearby towns.

“I would love to reach every kid in this town that wants to come to DREAMS,” Carvin said. “The more that we are able to offer, the more kids we could get off that waiting list.”