What is the value of an arts degree? How do arts graduates define success and how can educational institutions better prepare arts students for career achievement? The responses of 13,581 arts alumni to the Strategic National Arts Alumni Project (SNAAP) survey in 2010 provide an unprecedented opportunity to answer critical questions. SNAAP results challenge pre-existing frameworks for evaluating the impact of an education. Prevailing views are fixated on measures related to salary and traditional employment options, whereas SNAAP findings suggest there are multiple ways to view the value of an arts education. Whether they work in the arts or in other fields, arts graduates continue to flex their creative muscles after graduating by using the creative skills they learned in school, teaching the arts, and contributing to the arts in their non-work time through volunteering, participating, and making and performing art. At the same time, arts alumni face hurdles after graduation and must draw upon a certain "pluckiness" to succeed. Arts training requires a balancing act between the development of creative talent and necessary support to navigate the job market. Both those evaluating the impact of arts degrees and those in a position to influence arts training must paint with broader strokes, looking beyond narrow educational measures as the sole defining features of educational success but also expanding the scope of arts training to provide students with the resources necessary to move forward in their careers. (Contains 12 tables and 38 footnotes.) [This paper was written with Sally Gaskill, Scott D. Jones, George D. Kuh, Amber D. Lambert, Jennifer Lena, Angie L. Miller, Kendall Park, Ellen B. Rudolph, and Leah Vanderwerp.]