Ray Arts Index v1.2 · published 2026-10-15
How a town’s grade is calculated.
The Ray Arts Index gives each town one letter grade for its arts life, across all eight art forms. This page explains, in plain language, what is measured, where the information comes from and how the grade is made.
What the Index measures
The arts life of a town
The Index looks at a town as a place to make and enjoy the arts: its venues and museums, how often things happen, its festivals, its arts organizations, what the local government and the schools put in, its creative businesses and its heritage.
It rates towns, never venues, groups or artists. Music, theater, dance, visual arts, craft, literary arts, film and museums all count toward one grade. The art forms are shown on a town’s page as a breakdown, not graded separately.
Eight subjects
What each subject measures
Each subject has a fixed share of the grade. Local government support and arts education carry extra weight: 30% of the grade together.
- 18%of the gradeLocal government support Extra weight
Direct arts spending in the town’s adopted budget, per resident (including a city-run arts center or theater at its operating cost); whether the town has an arts office, a city arts grant program and arts in parks and recreation; and its cultural web presence.
- 12%of the gradeArts education Extra weight
Whether the school district has a named arts leader or arts plan, and an arts magnet school or artist residency; plus arts schools, college arts programs and arts camps per resident.
- 18%of the gradeArts places
Active venues, museums and galleries per resident, and the seats in those venues.
- 13.5%of the gradeActivity
Arts events a month across the town’s calendars, per resident, and city-run performance series.
- 13.5%of the gradeFestivals
Arts festivals that are still active (a 2025 or 2026 edition, or a dated future one), per resident.
- 13.5%of the gradeArts organizations
Arts nonprofits per resident, and the revenue they bring in per resident.
- 7%of the gradeCreative economy
Arts businesses with employees, and self-employed creative workers, per resident in the town’s county.
- 4.5%of the gradeHeritage
Arts institutions founded in 2001 or earlier, and museum and history nonprofits, per resident.
Bonus honors
Extra credit that never costs a town
Three selective honors add bonus points on top of the eight subjects:
- a state arts-community program (Come Hear NC or SmART) in the town;
- A+ Schools, the arts-integration network, per resident;
- a NAMM Best Communities for Music Education award, for the district or a school in town.
A town without them loses nothing, and the grade can never go above the top of the scale.
How a grade is made
From a count to a letter
- Per resident. Each count is divided by the town’s population (or, for the creative economy, its county’s), so size drops out.
- Three reference points. Each measure is placed between zero, the national typical level and a top level. Zero earns nothing, the typical level earns half the points and the top level earns full points.
- Doubling earns equal steps. Above the typical level, every doubling earns about the same number of extra points, so one very large number can’t carry a whole subject.
- Subject averages. A subject’s score is the weighted average of the measures known for it. A subject counts only when at least half of it is known.
- Missing information is never counted as zero. If a source couldn’t be found or read, that measure is left out, not scored as nothing. A zero needs a source that shows the absence.
- 80% to be graded. A town gets a grade once at least 80% of the information behind it is known. Until then it shows “Not yet rated”.
- A: well above typical
- B: above typical
- C: the national typical level
- D: below typical
- F: well below typical
- Not yet rated: under 80% of the information found
Where the information comes from
Public sources, every one linked
- IRS exempt-organization records, for arts nonprofits and their revenue;
- US Census Bureau population estimates and business counts (County Business Patterns and Nonemployer Statistics);
- adopted city budgets, for the town’s own arts spending;
- school district websites, for arts leadership, magnets and residencies;
- the North Carolina Arts Council, for state arts-community programs;
- event calendars of venues, towns and visitor bureaus, for how often things happen;
- festival websites, to confirm a festival is still active;
- and the listings in this directory, for venues, museums, galleries and arts education.
Every value has a source link and a quote from that source, with the date it was read.
What’s not measured yet
Known gaps
These are left out today, never counted as zero.
- Cultural web presence of town governments hasn’t been reviewed for any town yet.
- Founding years of most arts institutions aren’t recorded yet, so the Heritage subject isn’t counted for any town today.
- Venue seating is known for too few venues to count in almost every town.
- City performance series have been checked only in the first 29 towns the Index measured.
- Town arts budgets can’t be read yet for some towns: budgets posted as scanned pages, and arts spending folded into a larger parks or events line.
- Literary and craft places are still thin in the directory. Event calendars and festivals already count all eight art forms.
Because of these gaps, no town can reach full coverage yet. That is why the bar for a grade is 80%, not 100%.
Versions
Method v1.2, published 2026-10-15
The grades shown today come from Ray Arts Index v1.2, published on 2026-10-15 after an independent check of the data and a full recalculation. When information is added or the method changes, every town is recalculated, and a record is kept of each version and what changed.