Americans for the Arts

In 1985 I graduated with a BFA in Illustration from Syracuse University, got an agent, designed images for publications, and discovered that I was lonely and bored to tears.

Arts Education saved my life. Years later as an artist with a teaching degree, I was anything but bored. I have been a certified arts educator, museum educator, teaching artist, and college instructor from Boston to Buffalo. I founded  PAE in 2000 and have provided services for educators, artists, and cultural partners from all 62 counties in New York State. I am honored to be one of the National Arts Education Council members with Americans for the Arts.

My years as the Newsbreak Editor for Teaching Artist Journal (Columbia College Chicago) continue to be especially not-boring...and I am proud to say that I am once again on the Syracuse University campus as an instructor and student in a brand-new era of arts education.

I’m Victoria Saunders, an arts consultant, arts education supporter in San Diego, California. My connection with this issue started early in life, as both my father and his twin brother were arts educators; the former a classroom teacher and the latter a state arts consultant. I have been an arts administrator and consultant for almost 20 years, obtaining my masters degree in 1991 from the University of Oregon. At that time they had an arts education department and I was able to tailor my degree to fit my interest in the role of community arts in arts education. Since then I have focused my arts education leadership, research and advocacy work on community arts organizations and local arts agencies as critical partners in the larger delivery system.

One of my ongoing questions is “what is the role of local municipal government in the delivery of arts education for its residents?” I want to share a recent project that highlights how one budget strapped LAAs carved a clear role for itself in the local arts education ecosystem.

This year my colleague David Plettner (Cultural+Planning Group) and I worked as team mates on a project with the City of San José’s Office of Cultural Affairs (SJOCA). A local arts agency (LAA) in California’s east bay area, their goal was to create a strategic plan for their arts education programs. The SJOCA has a long history of providing arts education for students in the San José and Santa Clara County area that dates back to the mid 1970’s. Like many LAA’s their programs were developed in reaction to state or national trends and economic challenges and without a clear plan to inform their efforts.

I currently work with the Alliance for Arts Learning Leadership, a project of the Alameda County Office of Education.  Alameda County, located east across the bay from San Francisco, has 18 school districts ranging from the urban Oakland Unified to Mountain House, a one school district almost in the Central Valley.  The Alliance includes the Alameda County Arts Commission, the 18 districts, community arts organizations, higher education, teaching artists, teachers, administrators, parents and youth.

I think it is important we use the term arts learning instead of arts education.  Parents and educators need to understand how and why the arts are essential in education and that by this we are not referring to dancing numbers or hand turkeys.  'Arts Learning' clarifies and encompasses three ways that the arts are core to both teaching and learning:

1.  Teaching the discrete arts discipline.