The Main Street Mile Initiative’s Community Coordinator Program is hiring a graphic designer. The position includes creating professional and informative graphics for social media platforms that spread awareness of the Main Street Mile Initiative’s programs.
The Community Coordinator Program extends the Main Street Mile Initiative’s reach into the Upland community, Jake McKim, the Community Coordinator Program Manager, said. The program runs initiatives local residents can participate in.
The program hires students to run those initiatives and allows them to focus and specialize on areas they are interested in, such as health and wellness, or community connections and event planning.
“With the sheer amount of programs that we have going on with the Main Street Initiative, there’s certain initiatives that are difficult for us to give our full attention to,” McKim said. “So these community coordinators have the opportunity then to specialize in a certain area and commit all their time and energy to it.”
At the start of the school year, the Main Street Mile Program held a number of listening sessions for Upland residents to learn what they felt the community needed and what Taylor could provide. It used the feedback as a starting point to plan programming.
A major part of the programming is the Beautification Grant, which is one of the largest programs that Main Street Mile runs, Alex Boothby, one of the Beautification Grant coordinators, said.
“The Beautification Grant is a grant we give out to members of the public that have property along the Main Street, or the immediate Main Street area,” Boothby said. “The goal of the grant is to help them essentially beautify the property and the area of the house that is visible from Main Street and to just promote the economic growth and appearance of Main Street.”
The project has been a success: they receive many submissions each application cycle from homeowners, businesses and non-profits, McKim said.To receive the grant, applicants must state which improvements they seek to create and the estimated cost of the improvement. A committee meets regularly to approve the applications. This committee aims to avoid turning down any applicants, although they have postponed some applications to save costs, McKim said.
“What we did is place a lot on hold because we had a lot of submissions for concrete projects — retaining walls, driveways, sidewalks, stuff like that,” Boothby said. “And so we’re currently working through some different ways we can drive down costs for those concrete projects.”
The Beautification Grant has accepted 26 projects and has awarded $139,000 in grant money.
The Coordinator Program is currently hiring a student graphic designer, a position of central importance to the Main Street Mile Initiative.
“The way most of the community engages with the Main Street Mile Initiative is through social media,” McKim said. “That’s where the program updates different initiatives we’re launching and events we’re hosting. So the ability to effectively engage with the community on social media is something that we’re really prioritizing, and we want to have someone on our team who can help us to create inspiring and engaging designs.”
Boothby currently runs the Initiative's social media. While he considers himself artistically capable, many of the needed designs are beyond his abilities. A dedicated designer would streamline the process of ensuring Upland residents are aware of the Initiative’s work, he said.
McKim is looking for students with experience in Adobe Illustrator and graphic design. He hopes to find someone with experience working with brand guidelines and the ability to quickly turn ideas into informative graphics, he said.
While hours may fluctuate based on demand, McKim estimates the designer will work for 2-5 hours each week, on a mostly remote and on-call basis.
The Community Coordinator program is geared towards getting involved with the community. Since community involvement today is reliant on social media, the graphic designer position will play an important role in the success of the program.
“The majority of people aren’t going to have face-to-face interactions with us.” McKim said. “If we can make sure that their interactions with us online are positive ones, that’s something we’re hoping to support.”
