By Susan Sachs Fleishman

If the name of a certain 2018 Urban Arts Leadership (UAL) graduate, Kai Crosby-Singleton, sounds familiar, you may have heard it recently in the news. His work with mentoring the “squeegee boys,” bringing them to the table with Baltimore’s leaders, and helping them establish their new Korner Boyz enterprise has received much notice. You may have seen him featured on WMAR TV on November 1, 'Squeegee Boys' start water bottle business with help of mentors, or on WBAL TV on the same day, 'Squeegee kids' take lessons learned to become entrepreneurs in Baltimore. Or perhaps you read about him in Dan Rodricks’ October 31 column in the Baltimore Sun, With the help of mentors, these Baltimore squeegee boys are moving into a new business.

This remarkable initiative is just one of the important programs that Kai is involved with in his job as a community liaison and event coordinator at the Maryland Institute College of Art’s Office of Strategic Initiatives. Another is the upcoming arts and innovation district on Pennsylvania Avenue. His department is charged with taking on new ways to engage the MICA community and Baltimore at large, working directly with and for the community. “I came to understand,” Kai says, “that undoing the disconnect between the worlds of art, culture, and tech will play a major role in removing the barriers to Innovation for underserved communities.”