Americans for the Arts

As we celebrated International Arts Education Week 2015 last week, I have a renewed interest in exploring what is happening around the world in the fields of arts and education; specifically where they come together.

The first International Arts education Week was held in 2012 at the UNESCO headquarters with representatives from all sectors involved including artists, educators, NGO’s and the like. To coordinate global efforts in celebration of the power and impact of arts education, the delegates at the UNESCO general conference approved a resolution designating a week to join together as a global community to celebrate on the 4^th week of May annually. This guide book is a great starting place for your celebration.

Advancements in arts education policy and practice never happen by accident. These occur because of the planning and actions of many people and organizations. This is true whether we are speaking of standards, graduation requirements, data gathering, teacher training, addressing issues of equity or the arts place as a core subject. As Congress now reconvenes, a top priority will be a final education bill and with it… the fate of the arts as a core subject. This means that we have reached a moment, once again, that will require the actions of many to ensure that the arts maintain their place as a core subject.

Here in New York City, and around the nation, this is a pivotal moment for arts education.

Fifteen years after the passage of the No Child Left Behind Act, which many credit with a pronounced narrowing of the curriculum in public schools across the country, an earnest effort to reduce the most onerous mandates of the law is underway.

The conversation around school accountability is beginning to shift from a test-based model to a more holistic view of what we expect of our public schools. And advocates are making the case for a more robust role for arts education in the debate over reauthorization of NCLB.

In the arts, it seems as though we always have something on our advocacy schedule. We’re advocating for funding. We’re advocating for support. We’re advocating to be included in education and strategic plans. Sometimes we’re even just advocating to exist. And because of our interconnectedness, we’re seldom just advocating for our own cause. We have to advocate for each other, too. We have to advocate for the field as a whole. And we have to advocate at every level of the system. With all of this advocating, sometimes it can be difficult to get our other work done. Some lucky arts organizations have the fortune of a staff member whose sole job is to work on advocacy efforts. But this just isn’t feasible for many, especially in rural states like South Dakota where arts professionals are overworked and underpaid.

I love going to meetings and trying to encapsulate what I’ve learned in major threads or realizations.  After considering the wide-ranging presentations and conversations from the Symposium a few weekends ago, I’ve arrived at five salient points.

1. The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) presents huge opportunities for arts education. There is, however, no guarantee that we will be the beneficiaries of those opportunities. First, the regulation process is ongoing as the Department of Education tries to decipher nearly 400 pages of legislation and convert that into practical guidelines. Second, even when those regulations appear, the place of arts education is not ensured. Instead, two rather important phrases need to be understood.

Scot Hockman

The Common Core State Standards (CCSS) may be the best whole school initiative to happen to arts education. The English Language Arts Standards (ELA) call for literacy in history/social studies, science, and technical subjects. Page 43 of an appendix to the ELA standards defines a technical subject as:

A course devoted to a practical study, such as engineering, technology, design, business, or other workforce-related subject; a technical aspect of a wider field of study, such as art or music.

The Common Core State Standards website clarifies this relationship between ELA literacy and literacy in history/social studies, science, and technical subjects:

Just as students must learn to read, write, speak, listen, and use language effectively in a variety of content areas, so too must the Standards specify the literacy skills and understandings required for college and career readiness in multiple disciplines. It is important to note that literacy standards in history/social studies, science, and technical subjects are not meant to replace content standards in those areas but rather to supplement them.

Finally, it seems that the arts are receiving the attention to which we are entitled as a result of being classified as a technical subject. The CCSS writers were savvy to include anchor standards for technical subjects so that other content areas would have to take note and be drivers of the English language arts (ELA) standards within the various other content areas. Mathematics provides that we address grade-level standards. And all the while, arts teachers must also take note of the significance of their state and national visual and performing arts standards while determining shifts from CCSS to arts standards.