Merryl Goldberg

Arts Education: Footloose Relationships

Posted by Merryl Goldberg, May 28, 2010


Merryl Goldberg

Merryl Goldberg

There is nothing like wonderful relationships to make life interesting, satisfying, challenging, and rewarding.  Our lives are filled with relationships from those we have with family, to friends, to partners, spouses, and even to those that are more passing, such as the relationship we have with the woman in the donut shop we visit every Saturday morning, or with the mail person, or with the stranger in the airport who doesn’t speak the same language, but nods in complete understanding as you wearily try to carry your bag, computer, and child through the crowded door to the check-in.  Our lives are filled with such relationships.

I was reminded of the importance of relationships this week as I attended my local High School’s performance of Footloose.  This is the same high school I wrote about last  year after they put on a production of Sweeney Todd.  This year’s performance was Footloose.  My high school neighbor, Gabe, a junior was the assistant stage manager, and we attended with his family and entourage on closing night.  Though I enjoyed the performance, what impressed me more was what happened after the performance.

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Zack Hayhurst

Is Arts Administration Research a 'Field of Dreams'?

Posted by Zack Hayhurst, May 28, 2010


Zack Hayhurst

Zack Hayhurst

In my last post, I ended with some questions about the academic field of arts management and how it should be studied. This past fall, I wrote a response to a paper that addresses this very same question.  The title of the original paper is Arts Administration: Field of Dreams by Charles M. Dorn. This paper, written in 1992, focuses on why the field of arts management lacks the seriousness afforded to other more established fields of study, and the steps that researchers in the field can take to change these perceptions. You can read my full response paper here.

The main idea of Dorn's paper is that the field of arts administration has yet to develop a shared set of standards and beliefs that would afford it the respectful status it so desires within the academic community. Part of why Dorn thinks there is little consensus on theories and terminology within the arts administration community is due to the diverse academic backgrounds of those who comprise the field.

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David Flatley

Making Meaning

Posted by David Flatley, May 28, 2010


David Flatley

David Flatley

Because so many of us need to raise a significant portion of our budget through grants to deliver arts education programming, we have the increasingly challenging task of articulating the “why” of this work to cash strapped funders. I’d suggest that it’s getting old to simply speak about “empowering” youth, and developing “critical thinking skills.”

Those are wonderful things, of course…objectives we all value and share; but as resources become more scarce, and we are driven to collaborate and build partnerships even more in order to maximize our leveraged and shared assets. We need to be more rigorous in our approach to articulating our impact. 

So I argue that for our own sake, if nothing else, let’s consider whether our continued use of phrases such as “Higher Order Thinking Skills,” “Critical Thinking Skills,” or “21st Century Learning Skills” might not become clichés, or worse, perhaps…that they might start to lose their significance. Do we all know what these terms mean exactly? And do we mean the same things when we use them?  I believe we start to do ourselves a disservice if we do not more explicitly articulate what these things look like, and how the arts make a difference.

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Victoria J. Plettner-Saunders

California's Local Arts Advocacy Network Effort

Posted by Victoria J. Plettner-Saunders, May 28, 2010


Victoria J. Plettner-Saunders

Victoria Plettner-Saunders

I want to follow up on my last entry about the Local Advocacy Networks (LAN) that were started in San Diego County this spring with support from the California Alliance for Arts Education (CAAE). As you might recall four LANs (Escondido, San Diego, Vista, and South Bay) were launched in April and May and so far two have held their first follow up meetings.

At each of these meetings approximately 10 or more people gathered to review the brainstormed ideas from the breakfast launch event, discuss their vision for arts education in their district, and identify who else should be at the table. Each one identified at least three action steps they could take over the next year.

The Escondido LAN reported that they want to 1) start a blog or Facebook page to help people stay connected; 2) collaborate with their local Escondido Arts Partnership which is building an open-access web database to connect artists in north San Diego county with the schools; and 3) look into developing a citywide arts fair, an idea from the breakfast that met with considerable enthusiasm.

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Tim Mikulski

A Special Thanks to Our Readers

Posted by Tim Mikulski, May 28, 2010


Tim Mikulski

Thank you for taking the time to visit, read, and comment on the blog posts throughout our Arts Education Blog Salon this week.

Thanks to the hard work of all of our bloggers, I feel like visitors had the opportunity to learn more about the various aspects of arts education – from advocacy to standards – that many of us work with on a daily basis, and engage the authors via thoughtful comments and emails.

Although the Salon is over, we will continue to add new blogs on arts education throughout the rest of the year, and I am truly looking forward to the next time around.

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Ms. Rachel Evans

An Open Letter to Pre-Service Arts Educators

Posted by Ms. Rachel Evans, May 28, 2010


Ms. Rachel Evans

Rachel Evans

Do you know any pre-service arts educators? Those starting or finishing the student-teaching experience? Please deliver this letter to their inbox. Comments to this blog, especially additional suggestions for motivations and action steps for the Pre-Service Arts Educator, are encouraged. Thank you! 

Dear Pre-Service Arts Educators

Congratulations! You’ve stepped forward as the bravest of souls willing to self-identify your passion for an art form and your commitment to the education of young people.  I hope that your university is working diligently to aid you in becoming equally effective as an artist and as an educator, with plenty of wise mentoring as you merge the two into one mind, one body, one professional. 

It’s imperative that you know there is a meaningful movement afoot to create Common Core State Standards for the Arts; it’s on the event horizon.  See recent Arts Education Blog Salon entries by Lynn Tuttle and John Abodeely

Did you roll your eyes at the thought of new standards? I thought you might have.  

So what follows is a list of reasons why you, and you specifically, should care about the creation of arts standards to be adopted by as many states in the country as possible.

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MacEwen Patterson

Art Inspires

Posted by MacEwen Patterson, May 28, 2010


MacEwen Patterson

photo Michael Hevesy

It is pretty amazing to think on the impact art has had on society and culture since the beginning of recorded history. It's one of the largest and most difficult to measure. One of my favorite minds, John David Garcia, defined it this way, "'Beauty' is the conscious perception of objective truth being communicated to our unconscious." (Introduction, Creative Transformation, http://www.see.org/garcia/e-ct-dex.htm)

So beauty, let's call it "art" in this case, is valuable based on the impact an object can have on the subconscious of the viewer. We look at something and stop for a moment and say, "Wow! That really moves me."

Two different people can look at the very same thing and have wildly divergent descriptions of that experience. Before recorded history, art was magical. Shamans drew possible futures onto cave walls; fertility, the hunt, prosperity, evoking the life they wanted for their communities.

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Joan Weber

A Middle School for the Arts: Can the Arts Save a School?

Posted by Joan Weber, May 28, 2010


Joan Weber

Joan Weber

My friend Larry used to be the coordinator of fine arts for an urban school district. There was no other staff in the office. He was the fine arts division for 85,000 students. As happens, he missed the connection with students that isn’t afforded regularly to central administration.

So, he went back into a school and became a vice principal, choosing a school that was struggling with all indicators: test scores, enrollment, school climate, suspensions, and so on.

Larry went to this school specifically because the system decided to transform the school through the arts. Beginning this fall, he will be the artistic director for the city’s first middle school for the arts.

The building is one of the most historic schools in the city. Great city leaders came from this school. The city talks of the “glory days” that once reigned when the arts were honored and students succeeded and the school system believes that the school will be saved through the arts.

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Donna Collins

Music and Advocacy...Sounds Like a Hit!

Posted by Donna Collins, May 28, 2010


Donna Collins

Donna Collins

Congratulations to the Tri-M Honor Society Chapter 2252 at Midview High School in Grafton, OH. As the keynote speaker for this year’s induction ceremony I had the opportunity to meet more than forty fabulous students who excel at music, academics, and leadership. 

Justin, the chapter’s president was an outstanding emcee for the evening and chapter advisor and professional music educator Lisa Manning provided a very distinguished event built on tradition and ceremony.

During the course of the evening students performed vocal and instrumental works of art. There were solos, ensembles, and duets. The music was beautiful, varied, and worthy of Tri-M honors. Parents, grandparents, and friends attended the induction and were so proud of the students’ accomplishments. Beyond the students’ musical talents was the recognition of their community service work. Also noted was the Chapter’s honor in being named as Ohio’s Tri-M Chapter of the year for 2009.

The students, without exception, were talented and also appreciative of their peers’ musical talents and leadership. Thirteen new inductees were honored and nearly thirty additional students received first, second, and third year honors.

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Victoria J. Plettner-Saunders

Public Schools Don't Prioritize Arts Learning as Much as Private and Charter Schools

Posted by Victoria J. Plettner-Saunders, May 27, 2010


Victoria J. Plettner-Saunders

As a new member of the Arts Education Council at Americans for the Arts, I quickly learned the “three pillars” of our platform this spring as we prepared for the Arts Education Preconference in June. The one that I’ve restated many times in the last month is “a movement from valuing arts education to prioritizing arts learning within the education system(s) and communities.”

I thought about it this morning as I read a quarter page ad in section A of the San Diego Union Tribune. The ad was run by a local private school and its headline is “It’s a creative day”. The text under a picture of a smart (as evidenced by the square glasses), kind of nerdy looking kid working on a clay pot says:

“Every week, elementary school students at Country Day receive instruction in the arts. Throughout the school year, they get to explore music, drama, dance, movement, and a range of visual arts. An essential part of our mission is to create well-rounded students – as comfortable with the violin and paintbrush as they are with reading and math.” It goes on to tell you how to get more information about their mission, educational philosophy, and curriculum.

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Victoria J. Plettner-Saunders

Advocacy at the Local Level

Posted by Victoria J. Plettner-Saunders, May 27, 2010


Victoria J. Plettner-Saunders

Victoria Plettner-Saunders

I’m Victoria Plettner-Saunders, a member of the Art Education Council and arts consultant in San Diego. One of the projects I’ve been working on this spring is the development of four Local Advocacy Networks for K-12 arts education in San Diego County school districts. It is part of a statewide project that the California Alliance for Arts Education (CAAE) began last year and has resulted in the development of at least 20 grassroots community-based arts education advocacy networks throughout California.

The model for developing each local advocacy network (LAN) is quite simple and easily replicable. A coordinator is identified in each community to help launch the initiative via an informational breakfast meeting. About 50 community leaders (e.g. politicians, educators, faith-based community members, arts organizations, school board members, etc.) are invited, which usually nets about 30-35 actual attendees. At the breakfast they hear presentations by school district staff about the opportunities and challenges their visual and performing arts programs are experiencing, as well as a brief contextual presentation by CAAE staff about the role and history of arts education in California’s public education system.

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MacEwen Patterson

Remember to Imagine

Posted by MacEwen Patterson, May 27, 2010


MacEwen Patterson

photo Michael Hevesy

To me, the arts are really the practice of remembering to imagine. I have a tendency to fall into habitual routines that require little forethought. But when I engage in the arts, I begin with the question, "How do I want this to look?" and then, "What feelings do I want this to evoke in the viewer?"

I remember when my son was 3 years old. We were in the living room and it was play time. He wanted to play with action figures and it wasn't enough that we use those figures in an imaginary setting.

For him, I had to have a unique persona, different from "Dad" that was playing with the action figure "dragon," while he had to be someone other than "son" playing with the action figure "knight." We chose to swap identities. He became "Dad" and I became "son" and together we played "dragon and knight."

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Gary DeVault

Prioritizing Parents in Arts Education

Posted by Gary DeVault, May 27, 2010


Gary DeVault

Gary Devault

A 2005 Harris Poll shows that 93 percent of Americans feel that the arts are vital to a well-rounded education for all children. The high percentage of Americans valuing arts within education, however, has not led to a prioritizing of the arts within the educational system. 

The Arts Education Council at Americans for the Arts believes that one of the primary focuses of this next decade must be to move from declaring value for arts education to helping decision makers prioritize arts education for all students. Several key groups need to be included for this process to be effective and sustainable: 1.) Local education decision makers; 2.) The business community; and 3.) Parents.  I would like to focus this blog entry on parents. 

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Donna Collins

Pizza, Politics, and College Kids…What a Combo

Posted by Donna Collins, May 27, 2010


Donna Collins

Donna Collins

One Tuesday in March I had a fabulous evening when I visited with students and staff at Marietta College…it was Pizza and Politics Night! Now that makes for a terrific combo!  We spent our time talking about advocacy, the role arts and arts education advocates, and how passion has such a central role in delivering our messages. Most interesting to me was the energy in the room and the willingness of every student to get involved.

We shared stories about our experiences ‘making the case’ and concluded that when advocates have a compelling story to share they have a much better chance of gaining a policymaker’s attention and support. Couple that personal story with data and research that compliments the message and you’ve got a winner! We must always remember to speak from where our audience is listening!

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Tim Mikulski

Should it be Us vs. Them? (from Arts Watch)

Posted by Tim Mikulski, May 26, 2010


Tim Mikulski

Tim Mikulski

As I covered in last week’s Arts Watch blog post (Glee-fully Supporting Arts Education), it certainly seems like the same three or four subject areas are continually battling it out for that last spot into the school building, before the funding door shuts.

Often, it is arts education classes like music, dance, theater, and art that are left out in the cold, but sometimes we’re joined by physical education, foreign languages, library services, and now even formerly-free afterschool sports.

Glee characters Will Schuster and Sue Sylvester battled in out over funding for the glee club or the cheerleading squad, but I’m sure just as often we are seeing Señor Schuster and the media specialist from the library having the same conversation that always starts with, “my subject area/sport deserves to stay funded because…”

While I’m not encouraging dancers, actors, French lovers, and information gatherers to storm the west wing of their school in a battle to the death against language arts, calculus, and physics fiends, I feel that we could be more equitable in the way that all of these subjects are taught in schools today.

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Tim Mikulski

Whatever Happened to Humanities Curriculum? (from Arts Watch)

Posted by Tim Mikulski, Jun 02, 2010


Tim Mikulski

Two weeks ago, I joined approximately 40 other arts education leaders in a two-day meeting to discuss plans for National Expectations for Learning in Arts Education, a projected originally taken on by State Education Agency Directors of Arts Education (SEADAE).
 
For the first time in 16 years, arts education experts from national organizations spent time evaluating the possible impact and creating a plan for potential revisions, additions, or replacement for National Arts Education Standards.
 
Over the two days of discussion, I was struck by the passion in the room and energized by what will be coming in the next steps in the process.
 

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Joan Weber

Micro-advocacy

Posted by Joan Weber, May 26, 2010


Joan Weber

For three years I was the director of an organization whose mission is to make arts education and arts integration an integral part of the education of every child in an urban public school system. Our goal was to organize on a city-wide level to bring together the arts and cultural organizations and the school system, a la Big Thought in Dallas, our model. At the same time, we were working school by school to create systemic reform using arts integration.

It is very hard work, especially in times of economic uncertainty. We (schools, cultural organizations, teaching artists, parents, advocacy organizations) agree on the common cause, that all students in our city deserve access to quality arts education from specialists in the buildings, through trips to cultural organizations and by bringing artists into the school. But, we have different ideas as to how to achieve that goal, especially given our current existential crises.

A school system is like a giant cruise ship that moves with great difficulty and at an incredibly slow pace. Arts education advocacy feels like being part of a flotilla of little tiny tugboats trying to push the cruise ship back into port. (Sometimes, each tugboat is trying to push the cruise ship into a different port.) And, when you look at other parts of the cruise ship, you’ll find thousands of little tugboats flying different flags (phys ed, foreign language, business, etc.), working with all of their strength to push the ship in the direction of distant ports.

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John Abodeely

The New Common Core for the Arts are Imperative

Posted by John Abodeely, May 26, 2010


John Abodeely

The Common Core for the Arts are a huge triumph for our professional community—for arts teachers, teaching artists, cultural organizations, supporters, advocates, etc. This is for two reasons:

1.    We’re keeping up with the other subjects.
2.    Three dozen people got together agreed on one giant thing.

Let me explain.

1.    We have to keep up with our peers. We have to pony up the same infrastructure, research, and political mobilization that our peers in the other core subjects are offering.  That’s true if we want arts education to be treated equally. And right now, the Common Core for ELA and math define policy advances (even if we disagree with the content or strategy). But there’s more.

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Gary DeVault

Arts Education in Jeopardy?

Posted by Gary DeVault, May 26, 2010


Gary DeVault

Greetings from the rural heartland of Wooster, OH. My name is Gary DeVault, and I am the Fine Arts Consultant for Tri-County Educational Service Center, and serve as a member of the Arts Education Council for Americans for the Arts. Tri-County ESC is a state and locally supported agency which serves the school districts in Ashland, Holmes, and Wayne Counties in Ohio to improve the quality of education for all children.

As Fine Arts Consultant, I supervise nearly 150 music, visual art, and drama/theatre teachers in the seventeen school districts in a three county region. I provide curriculum and instructional support; design professional development opportunities for arts, classroom teachers, and teaching artists; coordinate arts services with community arts organizations and institutions; and provide direct services to students through numerous fine arts events and activities.

This school year has been filled with lots of exciting school music concerts, art exhibitions, plays and musicals. It is so gratifying to see the results of student learning in and through the arts at public performances and art displays. However, much of my time lately has been spent advocating vigorously for adequate funding for arts programs; seeking additional sponsors, donors, and/or grant resources for arts projects; and making the case with school board members and superintendents for keeping arts teachers employed in school districts where failed tax levies and a weak economy is threatening the inclusion of arts education for all children.

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Lynn Tuttle

For Educators, Getting Professional Development Can Be Tough

Posted by Lynn Tuttle, May 26, 2010


Lynn Tuttle

In the Americans for the Arts May 2010 Monthly Wire, a Top-10 list of reasons to attend the Half-Century Summit in Baltimore in June included: Reason #4: “Think you don’t have the time? Fake a cough or take a well-deserved vacation day (just kidding!).”

Unfortunately, for many of my colleagues in arts education, this joke hits a little too close to home. Arts teachers in public schools are given very little time to attend professional development opportunities outside of their school or school district. In Arizona, the dance educators hold an annual “pink tutu flu,” where many have to call in sick in order to participate in a statewide professional development day for dance teachers. Even when the day was devoted to our new state standards in dance, many teachers couldn’t take the day as a professional work day – they had to call in sick.

Colleagues working at the state level don’t necessarily fare any better. One of the leaders of my national organization, SEADAE (State Education Agency Directors of Arts Education), is routinely “sick” in order to attend Arts Education Partnership meetings.

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Tim Mikulski

Visiting an Arts Connection Dance Class in Harlem

Posted by Tim Mikulski, May 26, 2010


Tim Mikulski

Thanks to the kindness of Arts Education Council member Steve Tennen, I had the opportunity to visit a dance class at New York P.S. 241 in Harlem last week during a sojourn to the New York office of Americans for the Arts for other meetings.

Over the past 30 years, Steve's organization, Arts Connection, has provided the students of New York City schools access to art, music, media, visual arts, and dance, and the countless accolades they have received throughout that time demonstrate their undying devotion to the cause that is so near and dear to our hearts.

Following the hour-long session, dance teacher Yvette Martinez did an amazing job of explaining everything that she is able to do with the children thanks in part to a grant from MetLife. Not only is she providing them with quality dance lessons, but she is also working well beyond the topic of dance. She includes lessons in how the muscles of the body work, how the food the children eat impacts their current and future health (many of them are already diagnosed with diabetes and their families have histories of heart complications and cancer), and how to read food labels on the sides of their food.

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Donna Collins

Honoring My First Advocacy Instructor

Posted by Donna Collins, May 25, 2010


Donna Collins

Donna Collins

I’m a wife, a mom, and a grandmother (affectionately known as Grammy by my grandgirl Cierra).  A typical day starts at 7:00 AM and concludes around 8:00 PM, working Saturdays, and participating in lots of evening events  - a similar schedule to many of my arts advocacy colleagues. Work and family are what I eat, breath, and sleep. Most of the time one is as important as the other and each have their distinct needs and rewards.

On April 26, 2010, my world came crashing down around me when our 31-year-old son TJ died. It isn’t supposed to happen this way. Parents should not bury their children. Through TJ’s death, our grieving, and our memories I now see the world through different lenses. Simple things are more valuable, time is critical, making contacts a necessity since we’re not sure how much time we have, and telling our stories is essential to our future.

I rarely reflect, and until recently didn’t remember, why or how I got into the arts and arts education advocacy business. Thinking back on TJ’s life reminded me that he was the reason.

TJ was our theater and music kid. His brothers Josh (the athlete) and Ryan (the dreamer and reader) offered up other ways to get involved as parents. But theatre and music programs require a special kind of parent volunteer. You have to fight for the music and drama programs in schools. You have to raise money and pay for band camp. You have to work on levy campaigns to protect arts education programs. You have to take long bus rides to get to Disney or a special by-invitation-only parade. You have to pay a special facility fee to keep the theater open late for Friday night’s show and Saturday’s matinee.  You have to drive five kids to the next concert so the show choir can perform at the retirement home. You have to compete for time and resources with the athletic boosters and PTAs.
TJ knew about advocacy!

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Joan Weber

The Real Goal of Arts Education, According to One Person

Posted by Joan Weber, May 25, 2010


Joan Weber

Joan Weber

I’m having a very interesting 140-character-at-a-time conversation with a colleague I’ve never met about the goals of arts education. @readtoday is a professional artist whose goal is to start a “reading revolution.” The question on the table in our conversation is, “If we understand the goal--Genius? Creativity? We can design the #artsed curriculum.”

I’ve been thinking a lot about the question since it was posed this week. It’s not that I haven’t thought of it before; it’s that I’ve never been asked for an answer. What do I think the goal (singular) of arts education should be? I’ve decided that my answer is the same as for language arts and math--literacy.

I’m coming at this answer from the perspective of teaching artist, but also an adjunct community college professor, teaching “Humanities Through the Arts” twice a semester to middle-class, suburban students ranging from 18-80. Each semester I’m confronted with students who have little to no literacy in any art form. Each semester, my goals are the same: 1. Provide students with the language to think about and discuss all art forms. 2. Persuade students to give every work of art a chance. It’s not about taste.

My favorite word in my arts appreciation class is “composition.” It’s a word that the students think that they know because they’ve heard it so many times, but they don’t. Not really. “Composition” is a word that is shared by all of the art forms. Art is composed through the arrangement of the elements of its form. 

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Mr. Joe Landon

Building a Statewide Network of Arts Education Advocates

Posted by Mr. Joe Landon, May 25, 2010


Mr. Joe Landon

Joe Landon

When I joined the California Alliance for Arts Education as its policy director in 2006, they were savoring the hard earned victory that led to California’s historic investment in arts education, including the one time block grant shared with physical education, as well as the ongoing “Arts and Music” categorical funding.

But even then, the Alliance’s concern was shifting toward the question of how to sustain advocacy at the local level, where crucial decisions made by local school boards determine the quality, equity, and access of arts education in that school district.

When last year the state legislature gave local districts the ‘flexibility’ to spend the Arts and Music Block grant on whatever programs they considered most essential, the Alliance had already embarked on a project to build a local advocacy network in communities and districts throughout the state.

In the first year of this pilot program, we selected ten sites throughout the state, reflecting diverse communities, geographical areas, and economic conditions. Our goal was to gather the expertise around what would be required to foster an ongoing coalition of local leaders who share a commitment to build public understanding and support for the critical role of arts education in the development of every student.

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Lynn Tuttle

National Standards for the Arts

Posted by Lynn Tuttle, May 25, 2010


Lynn Tuttle

Lynn Tuttle

Editor's Note: For the latest on the national arts education standards movement, read this post by Arts Education Council Member Lynne Kingsley published on 9/20/11!

In 1994, the professional associations representing dance, music, theatre, and visual arts teachers, collaborated on the creation of national Voluntary Arts Standards. The arts were the first subjects to create national voluntary standards.

Later this year, the National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) will release Common Core State Standards for Math and English Language Arts. 48 states have already agreed to adopt these new standards as the basis for their state-level standards in English and Mathematics. The Obama administration is rewarding points for implementation of Common Core Standards in its competitive education grants, including Race to the Top, and has signaled a continued interest in the Common Core Standards movement in their Blueprint for Reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act.

In response to the interest around the Common Core State Standards initiative, and to the technological changes the arts and arts education have undergone in the last 15 years (I wasn’t blogging 15 years ago, were you??), the State Education Agency Directors of Arts Education (SEADAE) convened a meeting of national arts education stakeholders on May 11-12 to determine if the time is right to develop a new set of national standards. The resounding answer was “yes!”

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Michael Sikes

Evaluating for Pattern

Posted by Michael Sikes, May 25, 2010


Michael Sikes

Michael Sikes

My interest in the way that things are connected began when I browsed through a college textbook one day, and my eyes fell on the following passage:

Scientists noticed that on the opposite sides of a farmer’s fence, though separated by only a few inches, two very distinct communities of animals and plants lived. This realization gave rise to the new field of ecology.

I was fascinated by this word and the implications that I guessed. Ecology: the science of the relationships among living things and their environment.

Paul Hawken in his recent book references the concept of “solving for pattern,” the premise that community challenges are interconnected and to solve them we must design approaches that are equally interconnected and systemic. As John Muir noted, “When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe.”

This is a vital concept for evaluators and managers of evaluation. If we are to assist in the amelioration of these systemic processes, we need to use evaluation systemically, to “evaluate for pattern.” What does this look like in practice? Certainly, it is marked by constant attempts to understand connections: How is a specific program, need, component, etc., connected to others? Which ones? How can the connections be portrayed, measured, observed?

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Zack Hayhurst

Arts Management Education - A Lesson in Setting Expectations

Posted by Zack Hayhurst, May 25, 2010


Zack Hayhurst

Zack Hayhurst

A year ago, when I told people I was going into arts management, the inevitable response was always, "What is that?", or my favorite, "What will you DO with that?"

At first these questions irked me. Does one studying business or communications or finance get these same questions? Then I realized, maybe this is a common question for the art management field simply because not many people know who arts managers are, or for that matter, what they DO.

Prior to starting grad school, I had opinions and perceptions about what this degree would entail, and the opportunities it would create, so I would often retort with quips like, "Well, I will manage an arts organization, naturally." Now, with one year of the program successfully under my belt, and a handful of "real-world" arts administration experiences, my perceptions and expectations need a little re-shuffling.

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John Abodeely

The Reason Arts Education Lacks School Day Resources is Because Arts Ed Professionals Don’t Do Quality Work

Posted by John Abodeely, May 24, 2010


John Abodeely

John Abodeely

This probably isn’t going to be a popular statement. But let’s throw it out there and see what folks think.

I believe that if arts education professionals provided amazing arts education to students, we wouldn’t have to fight for time in the school day, money in the school budget, or support among our neighbors. From firsthand experience, I know creating art and can be transformational. I believe that if the arts teaching workforce—whether teaching artists, certified arts teachers, or arts integrationists—could regularly and reliably facilitate the best arts education experiences for their students, there would be no question as to the absolute need to provide arts education.

I wouldn’t suggest this is easy. But I think it’s still true. And yes, the implication is that our work—collectively, across the country—isn’t good enough.

To be fair, I can see a couple obstacles to it.
1.    Our governance agents diminish the value of spiritual or personal value when there’s a tax dollar involved.
2.    Scaling up transformational, personally-demanding education would be hard.

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Donna Collins

Supporting Arts Education is Essential

Posted by Donna Collins, May 24, 2010


Donna Collins

Donna Collins

How can school districts sustain and develop high quality arts education programs for students? These are tough times but tough times call for smart choices. Arts education is a solution to closing the achievement gap!

Education in the arts prepares students for careers. Americans for the Arts reported in 2009 that nationally there are 612,095 businesses in the U.S. involved in the creation or distribution of the arts that employ 2.98 million people – 4.3 percent of all businesses and 2.2 percent of all employees.*  The arts mean careers and business!

The arts are recognized as a core subject which places arts education at the same level of importance as language arts, mathematics, science, social studies, and foreign languages. The arts are part of the core!

Arts education programs are an instructional opportunity to improve student achievement. The arts help close the achievement gap!

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Merryl Goldberg

Arts Education: Informed by Catterall and Ravitch

Posted by Merryl Goldberg, May 24, 2010


Merryl Goldberg

Merryl Goldberg

The following is a keynote I delivered to administrators, teachers, and parents in Encinitas, California as part of an end of the year arts celebration. The celebration highlighted the professional development of elementary teachers who had engaged in learning about integrating the arts and technology throughout their curriculum, and how they applied to it their classrooms.

I was in a challenging position in that the district had just announced plans to cut several programs including arts, GATE, and some professional development. My talk is an attempt to both celebrate the teachers' accomplishments and at the same time make a case for the administration to reconsider their budgetary priorities.

Note: My talk was preceded by a dance performance by 3d through 5th graders, after which I commented:
"What you've just seen is not just cute….you’re seeing kids who are learning to practice, and learning the skill of practicing – kids engaged in developing a sense of discipline and collaboration, and for many of these kids – it is their first and perhaps only introduction to being on a stage.....note the smiles – the kids are engaged – and engaged kids want to attend school – research studies show that there is a direct correlation between school attendance and arts activities."

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