If the performances at the Marie W. Heider Center for the Arts are even bigger and better next season, one of the reasons might be the series of meetings that took place recently.

Back in May, members of the the Heider Center Board of Directors learned that they had won a Cultural Facilities Assistance Grant from the Wisconsin Arts Board. Part of the award included funds to conduct an organizational and community assessment.

The assessment was conducted by Megan Matthews through the auspices of the Wisconsin Arts Board and began with a three-hour meeting of the board. Board member Jean Ledman said that although none of the board members are paid, attendance for the Friday meeting (and the Saturday meetings as well) was 100 percent.

“Everyone came — that was so cool!” Ledman said.

During the first session, board members were asked to assess the Heider Center’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. After that, each board member was asked to identify the three items that were most important.

A vote was taken, and working groups were assigned to the three highest ranking items and asked to establish goals.

On Saturday morning, board members remained silent as they observed the community assessment being conducted by Matthews.

“If we know how the community feels about itself and about the Heider Center, we can better plan for the future,” she noted.

Prodded by Matthews, roughly two dozen community leaders (out of 51 who were sent invitations) shared their perceptions of West Salem and the Heider Center.

A consensus seemed to emerge that the Heider Center is an exceptional place for the arts, that it should remain affordable and continue to sponsor a diverse array of music, theater and the visual arts.

The major goals for the two-day event for the board were to gain a better understanding of the public’s perception of the Heider Center, determine how to better involve the community, plus determine ways the board could be more effective.

Among the relatively few changes suggested were the idea of more afternoon performances and more education prior to a performance.

Matthews agreed that more education can be a good idea: “The last thing you want is to have people walk into a performance and think ‘I can’t get it or I’m too stupid.’”

She added that, regarding the possibility of more daring performance choices, “sometimes you have to build trust before you push the envelope.”

It would appear that Heider Center audiences have been liking what they’ve seen of late. Two years ago, there were 139 season ticket holders. Today, that number is at almost 300 (the theater has 649 seats).

Asked whether the meetings accomplished the board’s goals, Ledman had a quick response.

“Oh my gosh, yes,” she said. “Our intentions are to incorporate the information gathered from the community assessment when writing grants. The Heider Center cannot grow and prosper without the involvement of the community.”

Although a total of 51 invitations were sent out to community leaders. Ledman said she was encouraged many of those who could not attend because of other commitments expressed regret and asked to be invited back if something like this were ever done again.

According to Ledman, that is a certainty. “We learned how to do a community assessment and we will definitely be doing this again. Grants will ask how you intend to involve the community, so this will be very helpful in getting future grants.”