Jessica Henkin and Laura Wexler are sitting at a sun-soaked table in Wexler’s Roland Park dining room on a Sunday afternoon, a binder stuffed with 20 years’ worth of memorabilia scattered around them from Stoop Storytelling.

There are programs, postcards, photographs, articles (including one from The Washington Post, when they hosted all of the Baltimore’s mayoral candidates), and even a neatly folded branded T-shirt that looks like it’s never been worn.

There’s also a thick folder full of consent forms—all storytellers need to sign them. Wexler reaches in, pulls a page out at random, immediately recognizes the name, and remembers the exact story they told. And then she does it again, and again.

That’s especially impressive considering that more than 4,000 people have told a seven-minute, purportedly true tale at one of Stoop’s live shows or workshops, according to Henkin, pictured left above. “Don’t you think that number is low?” presses Wexler, right.

One day, perhaps, they’ll do an official count. So far, though, themes have ranged from “My Nemesis” to “The Seven Deadly Sins” to “Cool Cruel High School” to “Parenthood” and one of Wexler’s most memorable—“Abortion is Autonomy: Stories About Freedom, Challenge, Care, and Joy” in August 2022.

Their very first show took place at the Creative Alliance in February 2006. “We picked the theme ‘failure’ because we thought that would be clever if it was a failure,” jokes Wexler. But they enlisted a stellar group of storytellers, including writer Laura Lippman, TV personality Marty Bass, filmmaker Charles Cohen, and Valerie Perez-Shere, founder of the water-ballet troupe Fluid Movement.

“We sold out that first show by begging people to come,” says Wexler. But it was a hit—even with their first musical guest playing a “man drum” (yes, he played drums on his own body) and providing a really jarring thunderclap sound as an audible cue for storytellers who went over their allotted story time (now they use a bell).

Music has always been an important part of the night, too—they had Caleb Stine & The Brakemen as their house band for years—because “we wanted it to be a show and not a talk or a presentation,” says Wexler. “It was supposed to be a night out. We definitely wanted alcohol. We wanted it just to be a full buffet of things.”

In the years since, they’ve taken the show to Center Stage, the Senator Theatre, the Joseph Meyerhoff Symphony Hall (their biggest crowd ever), and smaller incubators like hospitals, synagogues, board rooms, art spaces—even to the airways with a podcast on WYPR.

Wexler has stepped down as part of the live shows, and Henkin, a specialist with Baltimore County Public School’s Birth to Five Services, has carried on without missing a beat, often tapping her husband, Aaron Henkin, a longtime WYPR producer, as co-host. Wexler, who wrote for season three of Apple TV’s The Morning Show and is now finishing a play about an infamous 1925 annulment case, has taken on the role of Stoop education director, presenting storytelling workshops and collaborating with researchers to investigate how first-person storytelling can be applied in the medical field.

Their 20th year will kick off with two days of shows next month at the Creative Alliance, their old stomping ground—yes, Caleb will be back, too—and it’s brought about lots of reflection on where they’ve been and what’s next.

For now, though, Henkin is mostly just amazed that Stoop continues to exist in the very best way.

“It has been an incredibly loving act to produce this show in Baltimore,” says Henkin. “I am very grateful. And that is what I continue to be—grateful that people still come out for it, that I am still surprised by stories, that I’m still incredibly moved by stories. I definitely think it has made me a better human being.”

Wendel Patrick’s first memory is actually a dream. It was a recurring dream that he had for years, well into adulthood. It started when he was about 2, maybe even younger. The dream had no people in it. No light. But there was a steady sound—a beat. Something about that beat made Patrick realize he wasn’t alone.

“And then at some point, the rhythm—the thing that was repeating—became more intense and rapid, and then it stopped,” Patrick says. “And there was nobody else. I knew I was by myself.”

When he could find the words, maybe he was 3 or 4 by then, he asked his mother about the dream. She burst into tears.

Years later he would find out that he had a twin who died in childbirth. The twin’s name was…Wendel Patrick Gift.

This all becomes a little less confusing when you learn that Wendel Patrick was born Kevin Gift. For the first part of his life, everyone knew him as Kevin. He studied classical piano and earned a master’s degree in piano performance from Northwestern University School of Music. But he also started experimenting with electronic music, improvisation, and hip-hop. He bought mics and drum kits and samplers.

When he released his first hip-hop album, folks who knew him only from classical music were confused. He felt a need to distinguish the two sides of his musical life. So for the hip-hop persona, he would go by Wendel Patrick, after his brother, whose presence he always intuitively felt. His classical music persona would stay Kevin Gift.

At the time, he didn’t realize how blurred those two identities might become. That he would become a famous hip-hop producer and musician. That he would bridge the two worlds by bringing hip-hop into the hallowed halls of Peabody Institute. And that it would be a very long time before he would play classical piano again.

Another one of his earliest memories involves the piano. He and his family were living in Venezuela. His father was a diplomat, so they moved around a lot. His mother wanted his older sister, Deena, to start taking piano lessons. She brought Deena and Wendel to the studio of a well-known teacher. Young Wendel, then just 4, also played for the teacher, banging on the keyboard with glee.

“I’ll teach the girl but only if I can teach the boy as well,” the teacher said.

And so his musical journey began.

Patrick, now 51, showed an enormous aptitude for classical piano and it was one of the things that grounded him as his family moved from D.C. to Venezuela to Jamaica. Whenever they would stay at a hotel, his mother would make arrangements for her two children to practice the piano in the lobby or the lounge, if they had one. It was a source of continuity and comfort in his life.

But when he was 14, he stopped playing. He was a teenager—he had other interests: sports, girls, popular music, especially hip-hop. He loved Public Enemy and Eric B. & Rakim. A friend turned him onto the reggae-tinged hip-hop of Boogie Down Productions, which he couldn’t get enough of.

“I still loved classical music,” he explains. “But I just didn’t listen to it that much.”

He went to college, undergrad at Emory University. He majored in political science, figuring he’d be a diplomat like his dad, or maybe a lawyer. One day, a girlfriend asked him to play piano. He demurred at first but finally agreed. She was impressed with his talent, but he was stunned. He sounded terrible, at least based on his own high standards. He had assumed the facility would always be there, but he now understood he needed to use it or lose it. It bothered him, more than he expected.

He began studying piano at Emory and realized that music was his true love. He went on to get that master’s in piano performance at Northwestern. But his love for hip-hop was still percolating. It was the ’90s, so you couldn’t record things on a computer. You needed physical equipment. Mics. Recorders. Turntables.

He began experimenting with different electronic and hip-hop sounds, all while studying to become a concert pianist. In 1997, he moved to Baltimore, where his mother was living (she and his father had divorced by then). He got a small, grubby apartment in Mt. Vernon—by far his biggest and most expensive piece of furniture was his Steinway piano.

Then, in 2005, he had just come home from playing a Mozart piano concerto in Bolivia when he realized that his index finger on his left hand felt strange. He figured he just needed rest. He took two weeks off from playing. When he tried again, the finger felt worse—weak, almost like he had no control over it. He went to a clinic that specialized in hand injuries. The doctors asked him to play. Afterwards, the room got very quiet.

“You’re making me nervous,” he said.

The doctors told him he had a nerve condition called focal dystonia. It was the same condition that Peabody’s most famous professor, the pianist Leon Fleisher, had suffered from. It effectively ended Fleisher’s career as a concert pianist.

This was obviously very depressing news—existentially depressing, in some ways. But Wendel Patrick (who was then still only known as Kevin Gift) has the kind of restless creative spirit that can’t be extinguished. He got more involved in photography, a pastime he had picked up while on tour with a band. He started experimenting more with electronic music. He made that first hip-hop album. And Wendel Patrick was born.

“I DON’T THINK HIP-HOP NEEDS ANY VALIDATION OF ANY KIND. THAT’S NOT WHAT THIS IS ABOUT FOR ME AT ALL.”

If you live in Baltimore, you might know Patrick in any number of ways. Maybe you took piano lessons from him at Music & Arts in Timonium or Ellicott City back in the day. Maybe you’ve attended one of his Boom Bap Society concerts—a series of lively, improvised hip-hop jam sessions that he started with his friend, the composer and DJ Erik Spangler, 14 years ago. Maybe you’ve watched the Maryland Public Television series he hosts, Artworks, where he interviews fascinating members of the local arts community. Maybe you’ve listened to his albums or his collaborations with the likes of spoken word artist Ursula Rucker or Baltimore’s own Eze Jackson.

Quite possibly, you know him through Out of the Blocks, the podcast he co-produced with Aaron Henkin. Patrick wrote the ineffably cool, jazzy scores that accompanied the podcast, which produced intimate audio profiles of city blocks and their people.

When Henkin approached Patrick about collaborating on Out of the Blocks, he was simply hoping to use some of Patrick’s pre-existing music. He had been a fan of the musician since he interviewed him for a WYPR show called “The Signal.” But Patrick had another idea: What if he wrote customized soundtracks for each episode, incorporating the natural soundscape—the sizzle of the deep fryer, the whir of a dry-clean machine—into the music? Henkin was blown away.

“It was like asking to borrow someone’s used pickup truck, and then them saying, actually, let me build you a brand new Maserati from scratch,” he says with a chuckle.

Patrick became a co-producer of the show. He also got in the habit of taking striking black-and-white photos of the subjects featured on the pod. He and Henkin would hand deliver a print of the photograph to the interviewee, a way of saying thanks and staying connected.

Henkin says the photos also served as an icebreaker. “Like, everyone understands what a photo portrait is, but maybe not so much an audio portrait,” he explains. “It was almost like the pictures were easier for people to wrap their mind around than the audio.”

Henkin describes his partnership with Patrick as the most “productive, satisfying collaboration” of his life.

And now, Patrick is about to embark on one of his biggest challenges yet: heading up Peabody Institute’s new hip-hop program. Peabody will become the first conservatory in the world to offer a hip-hop degree.

It’s an overcast day in November and Patrick is sitting in his two-floor apartment in the Bromo Arts District, reflecting on his career and life. Downstairs is a rather elaborate studio with all manner of microphones, video equipment, turntables, mixers, as well as that beautiful grand piano. His bedroom is upstairs. (He moved into this larger space in 2012.)

Patrick is dressed simply, in a dark gray thermal top, black jeans, and bare feet. He has an elegant way about him—a calm voice, a thoughtful stillness.

He says he’s excited about the prospect of building this hip-hop department from scratch—in what can only be described as a coup, Grammy Award-winning rapper and producer Lupe Fiasco will be joining the faculty—but he wants to make something very clear.

“I don’t think hip-hop needs any validation of any kind,” he says. “That’s not what this is about for me at all. I think Peabody and institutions of higher learning are going to learn a tremendous amount by having hip-hop. But entering into this space is not somehow a badge of honor.”

Fred Bronstein, Peabody’s dean, agrees. “Hip-hop was the logical next step for us,” he says.

He notes that Patrick had been an adjunct and then assistant professor at the conservatory since 2016—teaching hip-hop ensemble and Hip-Hop Music Production: History and Practice. And in general, the school has expanded its technology programs to prepare its students for an increasingly digitized world.

Today’s Peabody students are learning about film and video game scoring, computer music, sound design, musical engineering, and more, along with studying the established classical masters. They’ve had a jazz major since 2001. Bronstein feels that Patrick was uniquely positioned to teach at the school.

“One of the great things about Wendel is that he was trained as a classical pianist at a high level,” he says. “And he found his way into these other disciplines, most obviously hip-hop. I think he brings a breadth of knowledge and an understanding of how hip-hop fits into a wider musical context and relates to other disciplines.”

Bronstein also wants to dispel the stereotype of a Peabody student who is monomaniacally focused on classical music. They are young people who love music. And like most music-loving young people, they love hip-hop. “Kendrick Lamar won a Pulitzer Prize,” he points out.

So if Peabody is ready for hip-hop, the question remains, is hip-hop ready for Peabody? Eze Jackson, the local rap artist and impresario who has collaborated with Patrick on a variety of projects, welcomes this development.

“I think it’s exciting for hip-hop,” he says. “It’s exciting for Baltimore.”

He says he wishes that, back when he was a young man, a degree like this had been an option for him. “When I got out of high school, I was an emcee, but there was no place to study hip-hop. So I went in the Navy, pretty much to try to find myself,” he says. “I studied hip-hop on my own, as a student of the culture and the craft. But if I could have stayed home and gone to Peabody instead of going to the Navy, hell yeah!”

And Jackson thinks that anyone who sees this as somehow a sell-out of hip-hop culture is being painfully shortsighted.

“Hip-hop is such a limitless art form that I don’t think it gets credit for, so I think it’s dope that Peabody is taking this jump to be the first conservatory to offer it. It shows respect for a craft that we’ve always respected.”

What’s more, Jackson says Patrick is the perfect man to bring the subject to academia. “His knowledge of hip-hop is unmatched,” he says.

“IF I COULD’VE GONE TO PEABODY INSTEAD OF THE NAVY, HELL YEAH!” JACKSON SAYS.

Patrick is already receiving applications and he’s excited about the caliber of students who are applying to the major, which will officially launch in September. He envisions the program starting out small—maybe six to eight students in the first cohort—and growing from there.

“Peabody is an institution that is filled with very skilled students,” he says. “And that’s exactly what I want for this program. I want top level turntablists, MCs, beat boxers, and producers to come. And I’m excited to see what this first group of students is—it’s gonna be exciting for all of them, as well as for the new faculty.”

Meanwhile, there’s been another positive development in Patrick’s musical life. About 15 years ago, after accepting the fact that he may never play piano again, he started attending these “Out of Your Head” jazz improv sessions at the Windup Space. (Those sessions would ultimately become the inspiration for the Boom Bap Society.) He would play the electronic keyboard. And much to his surprise, he found that he could play. His index finger was still hard to control, but less so.

“That was pretty mind-altering for me,” he says. Apparently, the intuitive motion of improvisation—as opposed to the highly formal movement of classical performance—rewired his brain a bit. “And that’s when I started to approach [my focal dystonia] as more of a curiosity and a problem to be solved,” he says. “As opposed to, ‘I hope this thing just goes away.’”

Since then, it’s gotten better. Not perfect. But he’s making progress.

It’s not a coincidence that it was improv that brought on this revelation. It was the world of improv, of hip-hop, of electronica that saved him in a way, when he lost his ability to play Mozart and Chopin. He was able to thoroughly immerse himself in that music, reinvent himself—it brought him friends, fans, collaborators, incredible musical experiences across the world, all culminating in this new program at Peabody.

And now, in a perfect merging of Kevin Gift and Wendel Patrick, it had brought him back to the piano, his first love.

Aaron Henkin’s voice might be better known than his bearded, bespectacled face, and it’s that familiar dulcet tone that is floating over the brick steps of Pigtown on this Wednesday afternoon as he interviews resident Judy Aleksalza for The Maryland Curiosity Bureau, his brand-new weekly WYPR podcast that asks listeners: “What are you curious about?” Then he dives in to find the answer.

Henkin is casually dressed—slim blue chinos, plaid cotton shirt—and the only thing that separates him from just making polite conversation with Aleksalza is the headphones, recording device, and small microphone that come from a tote bag connected to the station’s call signal.

“I wish this was on TV so you can see it,” says Aleksalza perched on her stoop and gesturing to her home, bought 45 years ago as part of the Dollar House program. That’s this episode’s question: Did the program work and could it be done again?

“It’s a podcast,” Henkin tells her. “We can paint a picture with words.”

And that’s exactly what Henkin has done these past 20 years since first landing at WYPR’s predecessor station, WJHU, in part because his gift is also in his silence. He’s a world-class listener with the ability to draw answers out of his subjects that are honest and nuanced. When he’s done interviewing Aleksalza, one of a handful of sources for this particular piece, he asks for 30 seconds of quiet to record the city sounds around him: cars driving by, leaves rustling, the whizz of bicycle wheels.

Baltimore has always been a welcome guest. First, with The Signal, a show devoted to exploring Maryland’s thriving artistic and cultural scene, and then again, with Out of the Blocks, which earned Henkin the national Edward R. Murrow Award in 2018 for a podcast dedicated to exploring the lives of complete strangers and sharing their stories of one city block. That series ended this past summer after nine years.

“What I loved most about Out of the Blocks was it was an excuse to just wander around Baltimore and encounter people I never otherwise would have met,” says Henkin. “The most challenging thing was that every conversation I went into with someone was from scratch, and I had no idea what kind of narrative arc would come out of that story—or if there would even be one.”

But with The Maryland Curiosity Bureau, Henkin gets the same high—the ability to traverse the town and meet random people—but “there’s a built-in narrative where every episode starts with a question, and it ends with an answer, or a failure to get an answer.” But even in the failure, “you’ll learn things that weren’t even suggested in the question, and it’ll still end up giving you a richer experience about life in Baltimore.”

Henkin has already delved into “where are Baltimore’s hidden streams” and in October, was lining up interviews for the charming question “is a city park a good place to meet someone and fall in love,” posed by a single woman whose grandparents met in Patterson Park.

One man told Henkin that he always drives by a sign that proclaims, “Baltimore is a nuclear-free zone” and always wondered what exactly that meant. Says Henkin, “People talk about the wisdom of the crowd—this is the curiosity of the crowd.”

It’s a bit of a gamble to put his show into his listener’s hands, but he has faith in his city.

“I had no idea about Baltimore when I moved here,” says Henkin, originally from the Midwest. “I’ve been here 20 years now, but I know I’ve heard more than 20 years’ worth of stories because I’ve been so lucky to do this work…It’s a front row seat into everything that’s interesting.”

Visual Art

Profiles of Color III
Fredericksburg, Virginia, artist Ronald Jackson reimagines African-American portraiture in his solo show Profiles of Color III: Fabric, Face, and Form at Galerie Myrtis. The mixed-media pieces are collaged with bold shapes and patterns, reminiscent of Klimt but with a contemporary African accent. June 30 through July 28, with an opening reception from 5 to 7 p.m. June 30 at Gallery Myrtis, 2224 N. Charles St.

Landmarked
Ada Pinkston explores historical landmarks and monuments in Landmarked, a highly participatory show that invites visitors to respond to prompts and, in doing so, become part of the exhibit as it unfolds. A pedestal in the gallery will serve as a space for performance art pieces throughout the duration of the show, including a special night of guest performers on June 16. June 1 to 22 at Cardinal, 1758 Park Ave.

Music

BSO’s New Music Festival
Imagine the elegance of classical music performance against the backdrop of Graffiti Alley and you have the June 22 Chamber Jam with Mind on Fire, Shodekeh, and Ok Miss, part of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra’s four-day New Music Festival. In its second year, the fest brings contemporary classical music to venues across the city, highlighting living composers. This year, Kevin Puts’ oboe concerto Moonlight, a piece commissioned by the BSO, will premiere at a free show at the Joseph Meyerhoff Symphony Hall. June 20 to 23.

John Williams at Camden Yards
Celebrated American composer (and lifelong baseball fan) John Williams—who has written scores and served as music director for films that include E.T., Harry Potter, Jurassic Park, and Star Wars—will be at Camden Yards on June 11 to throw the first pitch. Before the Orioles game, the BSO will perform a selection of his well-known pieces, starting at 6:30 p.m. The game will be followed by the June 13 Evening with John Williams performance at Joseph Meyerhoff Symphony Hall.

Theater

Nights on the Fringe
Ballet, theater, puppetry, film, crankies, spoken word, dance, circus arts . . . the list goes on for Nights on the Fringe, a vaudeville-inspired cabaret weekend presented by Charm City Fringe—in case you are itching to see some Fringe-worthy shows before the main festival in November. The evenings will be hosted by Aaron Henkin (WYPR’s Out of the Blocks) and Umar Khan (Gin & Jokes, Super Comedy). 8 p.m. June 8 and 9 at the Baltimore Theatre Project.

Literary Arts

Books in Bloom
The daylong Books in Bloom festival brings a host of writers across all literary genres to Columbia for readings, discussions, children’s activities, and a pop-up bookstore. The lineup includes Amanda Lucidon, Edwidge Danticat, Elliot Ackerman, Ian Mackenzie, Jane Delury, Jeannie Valasco, Katia D. Ulysse, Nathan Bomey, Sujata Massey, Vikram Sunderam, and others. 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. June 10 at downtown Columbia Lakefront, 10221 Wincopin Circle, Columbia.

Miscellanea

CreateScape
Creative Labs’ CreateScape event celebrates the DIY arts culture of Baltimore through a free, three-day open house at the group’s headquarters. With a focus on health, creativity, sustainability and collaboration, the fest, hosted by Creative Labs, will cross yoga and dance battles with live music and street art. An array of artisan vendors will give this event a festival feel. June 8 to 10 at Creative Labs, 1786b Union Ave.

Healthy Baltimore: A Festival of Wellness
The free Healthy Baltimore festival at Port Covington will bring an array of music, food, and health and fitness vendors aimed to get you on track—plus the inspiration to move your soul and your body with a performance by Talib Kweli. Pre-registration is required. 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. June 16 at The Field in Port Covington, 200 E. Cromwell St.

In a classroom overlooking the colorful Howard Street Bridge, Paul D. Miller swipes a finger across his iPad mini and pulls up a DJ app he developed with Apple. An image of turntables appears on a projector screen, and the room fills with the soulful voice of James Brown singing “Make It Funky.” As the turntables spin, Miller (better known as DJ Spooky) scratches the virtual record with a few flicks of his fingers, breaking down the percussion and horns until the funky beat becomes something new. As the music fades, Miller poses a question to the class of 13 students: What makes something original? “If I have 10 Lego blocks and I put them together in one way and millions of people see that one way, and I say, ‘Let me flip that around,’ that’s okay,” he says, describing an artist’s ability to subvert, or “remix” the familiar into something with new meaning. “It’s a healthy, creative response.”

Miller, an artist-in-residence through spring 2014 at Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA), teaches a Creativity and Innovation course with WYPR radio producer Aaron Henkin. Something of a globetrotting Renaissance man, Miller is the author of various books (including 2004’s Rhythm Science, published by MIT Press), and his multimedia work has been featured at the Venice Biennale and the Whitney Biennial. The class is part of the Design Leadership program, a groundbreaking partnership between MICA and The Johns Hopkins University’s Carey Business School. The 20-month graduate degree earns students both a Masters of Art and a Masters in Business Administration.

Sipping an after-class espresso at Red Emma’s, a North Avenue coffeehouse/bookstore across the street from MICA’s Graduate Studio Center, Miller says such discussions push students to think about the causes of creativity and the effects of human design in business settings and elsewhere. “Anyone can watch a YouTube clip or read a book,” he says, “but the problem is people aren’t given enough tools for thinking. How do you channel all that [information]? How do you shape and mold it to a practical and impact-oriented approach?”

“It’s almost like you’ve got these two sides of creativity,” adds Henkin. “You’re giving these students all of these tools to create, but then there’s the question: ‘How will they apply these creations for the best all-around benefit, not only to themselves, but to the world?’”

This type of approach is necessary, Miller says, because of the rapid rate of change in technology and business today. And while design challenges, and even the course curriculum, may change, “thinking about thinking is a tool that people can always use,” Miller says.

As the corporate world plays catch-up to embrace adaptability, graduates of the Design Leadership program can bridge the world of business and the world of design. “Paul says imagination is the ultimate renewable resource,” says Henkin, “and one of the best resources you can have on your team is—”

“A good idea,” Miller interjects.

“And also flexibility,” Henkin continues. “The business person who’s got that more humanistic platform is going to be less brittle than someone who’s just trained in business.”

It’s that depth and breadth of skills that draws students to the new program, which graduates its first class this spring. Students take 22 credits at MICA and 44 credits at Hopkins.

“I was looking for a mix of MBA and design,” says first-year Design Leadership student Julie Buisson, a native of France who has lived in the U.S. for the past 10 years. Buisson moved from Athens, GA, to Baltimore for the Design Leadership program after discovering it through a Google search. Dressed in a bulky, mustard-yellow sweater and holding a mug of coffee and a well-loved Moleskin journal, Buisson fits the picture of an art student, though she earned her undergraduate degree—in marketing, with an emphasis in sales—at the University of Georgia’s Terry College of Business.

“At Georgia, all of my friends were art students,” she says. “They showed me a different way of working. I took some art classes, and I realized that creativity is something you work on just like anything else.”

With the Design Leadership program, she’s filling a gap in her education. It’s the same for her classmates, who come from varied backgrounds, including architecture, nonprofits, photography, and even the oil industry. “There is something more that’s driving us,” says Buisson. “We all believe we should be trained as creatives—it’s just as important as being trained in analytics.”

That passion for cross-disciplinary education is exactly what the two schools look for in applicants, says David Gracyalny, dean of MICA’s School for Professional and Continuing Studies and the de-facto head of MICA’s side of the Design Leadership program. Sitting in his office inside MICA’s Bungalow building on Mount Royal Avenue, Gracyalny notes that Design Leadership students, like typical MICA graduates, develop skills to be more adaptable, resourceful, and collaborative-minded.

“We use the practice of art and design to teach people to be creative thinkers,” he says. “What they’ve learned here is a tolerance for ambiguity. This is not a degree teaching designers how to run a business. It’s about teaching transformational leaders in a variety of enterprises—people who can think through complicated problems—with a theme of multidisciplinary collaboration.”

And multidisciplinary collaboration is why the Design Leadership program was developed. Its beginnings can be traced back to 2007, when Carey professors Blair Johnson, Toni Ungaretti, and Ed Weiss began teaching Competitive Advantage: Design + Innovation, a class where students came up with creative solutions for challenges posed by local businesses.

For DAP (the Baltimore-based caulk and sealant firm), for instance, the Hopkins students proposed new products, marketing strategies, financial models, and prototype websites to help promote the brand to young do-it-yourselfers without alienating their baby-boomer parents.

After Johnson was recruited by MICA to assist with an unrelated project, he says the schools “recognized that there were knowledge gaps that could be bridged by adopting teaching, research, and industry practices from each school into an integrated experience.”

It came at a time when new research and publications—including Daniel Pink’s A Whole New Mind—ushered in an era of creative, right-brain thinking. This cultural shift prompted the two schools to create a more formal partnership. After a few iterations, the schools settled on a dual-degree program that folded Carey’s already-existing flex MBA, which exposes students to other disciplines, into MICA’s Design Leadership MA.

From an office in Harbor East’s glistening Legg Mason building, Kevin Frick, Carey’s vice dean for education, handles the staff-management side of the university’s MBA programs and works with Gracyalny on the Design Leadership program. The Carey School administration, Frick says, sees value in the program, because it provides MBA students with deep expertise in design, which can be applied to any business. “Design, as one student phrased it, is a way of thinking about the world,” says Frick. “We are not talking about just designing things; we’re talking about fundamentally shifting a thought process.”

Such comments echo Miller’s and Henkin’s sentiments and align with Carey’s slogan, “Business with humanity in mind.” Frick admits that some people hear the slogan and immediately think of not-for-profits, but he points out that it also means a healthy business is most likely to be found in a healthy community. He believes the Design Leadership program directly addresses that issue.

“Design, and thinking about the end user and the end-user community, is quite powerful as a combination,” says Frick.

As graduation looms, employment is on the minds of the 13 students. In between presentations of their final projects at the Graduate Studio Center, Molly Needelman, who studied graphic design as an undergraduate, knows there are challenges ahead in the employment market. In past jobs, she saw a divide between strategy and design and was often brought in at the end of the process instead of being involved from the beginning.

“I want to change that business model to bridge the different worlds,” says Needelman.

With that in mind, she’s been presenting herself as a design strategist, or in-house creative consultant, to potential employers. “It’s a lot of us trying to develop a position,” Needelman says, rather than fitting into already-existing job descriptions. “A lot of it has been a huge educational moment for employers as well.”

But Gracyalny isn’t worried. He describes the first grads as highly driven, pioneering spirits and notes that a company like Under Armour might be a good match for their cross-disciplinary skills.

And he sees Baltimore—a place where innovative ideas can not only be considered, but implemented—as the perfect environment to embrace this unconventional thinking. “What’s going to save the economy of cities like Baltimore,” he says, “are people who are willing to take a risk at times where maybe the best thing to do is try something new.”

Aaron Henkin agrees and likens it to the collaborative spirit he sees in Baltimore’s music scene. “You’ve got these musicians who, because of the spirit of this place, don’t have any qualms about getting together and making this new sound they didn’t know they were capable of,” he says “It’s the same thing with these two schools.

“They said, ‘Hey, why not try this out? We’re in town together, let’s take the best of what you’ve got and the best of what we’ve got.’ It’s almost like they’re making a new genre.”