Doudna uses multiple ways to pay for the variety of acts it brings in, including a portion of Eastern’s appropriated money from the state, the New and Emerging Artist Series Endowment Fund and other funds created by donors.

Dwight Vaught, the assistant dean of the College of Arts and Humanities, said he manages Doudna’s budget.

“The administration here will divide that money among all the departments, which Doudna gets a little bit of appropriated money,” he said.

The other source of Doudna’s funding is the New and Emerging Artist Series Endowment Fund. 

“This endowment fund started when the building was opened, and the way endowment funds work is that you put the money in a principle which is not touched,” Vaught said.  “Then you are able to have the proceeds of the interest every year.”   

He said the EIU Foundation holds the series’ principle money, and every year Eastern tells them how much interest the fund has earned.

“We also have some smaller funds like the classical music series endowment fund, which was started by some very generous donors many years back,” Vaught said.  “So if we are looking at something that is a classical music artist we can use some of that money to help underwrite those.”

He said those are the main sources of funding for Doudna.

The Doudna budget as a whole funds other things that go on in the College of Arts and Humanities, Vaught said. 

“There are visiting artist through the music and theatre departments as well as events like the Embarras Valley Film Festival, Lions in Winter and some of the humanities performances that happen along with the art events in Tarble,” he said. 

Vaught said the money is not just for Doudna to spend to bring the artists onto campus; many local pieces need to be divided up.

“The amount we have to spend on bringing tourist artists here is really only about a third of our budget total,” he said. 

The other parts of the budget are divided up to fit some of the other local needs.

Vaught said when they have a contracted guest to come perform at Doudna, no matter how much is in the budget for that year, they have to pay what was promised in the contract.

Stephanie White can be reached at 581-2812 or [email protected].