HELP SPREAD THE WORD - TELL YOUR FRIENDS TO JOIN ARTSEDMAIL
In This Issue
- California Budget Update
- New Online Source for Everything Creative in the OC
- Bay Area District and Community Partner Keep Arts Alive
- Making the Case for More Flexibility in School Budgets
- Drama Techniques Enhance Teaching
- Stakes are Raised in Washington State
- Alabama School Districts Feel the Pinch
- Ohio Governor’s Education Plan Includes Creativity
- A Music Teacher’s Perspective
- Performance Based Assessment Offers A Good Model For The Arts
- Musical Instrument Training Tied to Higher Verbal Test Scores
- Visual Thinking Strategies Used in Schools
CONFERENCES, PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT
- Harvard Project Zero Author to Present Findings on New Study of Quality
- Alameda County Arts Learning Anchor School Conference
RESOURCES, FUNDING OPPORTUNITIES
- Using Music to Make a Difference
- Summer Music Institute
- Idyllwild Arts Academy To Award Scholarships
November 20, 2008
ArtsEdMail provides all the latest information to connect the Arts Education community in California. Our free e-newsletter is published every two weeks.
We rely on you to support our efforts.
Become an advocate or make a donation today!
Thank you to those who responded to our brief survey. If you have not yet done so, please take a few minutes to help us learn more about how you have been engaged in arts education advocacy, how the Alliance has helped you in that role, and what suggestions you might have to improve the Alliance's efforts to mobilize a community of advocates. We urge you to take a moment to participate in this very brief survey. It will only take a few minutes and your voice is important to us. Click here to get started.
California
Budget Update
As you may know, the Governor has called the legislature back
into special session to deal with the fiscal crisis that never went
away, but is back with a vengeance, currently estimated as an $11.2
billion deficit. Legislative leaders have set Sunday as the working
deadline to vote on a budget package. Absent a breakthrough this month,
Schwarzenegger could call another special session on the budget immediately
after the new class of legislators officially takes office in December,
traditionally a quiet time in the Capitol.
In a briefing call from his office last week, the Governor proposed tax increases and budget cuts, including a $2.5 billion reduction in the education budget. In addition to a reduction in Prop 98 revenue projections, the Governor is proposing giving districts the authority to transfer 100% of categorical funds to the general fund, which includes any unspent balances from 07-08 and any new categorical funds for 08-09 (except those programs protected by Federal law, such as special education). As we discussed last May, this type of flexibility at the district level would undoubtedly result in cuts to the arts.
Local Action Needed Now: Write a letter to your local school board and superintendent, letting them know you believe it is essential that the intent of these funds – to support quality arts education in all schools - be protected in this budget year, allowing school districts the opportunity to implement their plans and begin to address the disparities in access that exist across the state and re-build standards-based quality instructional programs. Here is a sample letter you can copy into a word document and personalize. link to sample letter Should you have questions, contact Laurie Schell (laurie@artsed411.org) or Joe Landon (joe@artsed411.org.)
New
Online Source for Everything Creative in the OC
A joint project between Arts
Orange County and the Orange County Community Foundation, SparkOC.com, launched
this month. It is replete with all the information residents and visitors need
to experience and participate in arts and cultural events throughout the county.
“The goal of Spark OC.com is to inspire a groundswell of creativity and imagination
throughout Orange County by increasing involvement with the arts,” said Richard
Stein, executive director of Arts Orange County. This new online resource is
expected to become the “go-to source” for all performance and exhibition information
for theatre, dance, music and visual arts offered by more than 140 participating
arts organizations and venues in Orange County. Click
here.
Bay
Area District and Community Partner Keep Arts Alive
Unlike many California districts, Mountain View Whisman made sure that
arts education stayed in the curriculum when it came to budget and
program cuts. Through creative collaboration with the Community School
of Music and Arts (CSMA), the non-profit provider of arts education
to the district’s elementary school students for more than 20 years,
the district has scheduled more concentrated study in the arts this
year than in the past. Link.
Making
the Case for More Flexibility in School Budgets
An editorial in the LA Times makes the case for additional flexibility
in education budget. “If state and federal authorities cannot give California
schools extra money, they might look at providing extra flexibility.
To start, the U.S. Education Department should put an emergency moratorium
on the sanctions prescribed by the No Child Left Behind Act. As it stands,
schools that have fallen short of their testing targets must spend a
chunk of their federal Title I funds on tutors and transporting students
to other schools.” The editorial includes categorical funding in the
list of funds that should become more discretionary at the district level.
Click
here.
Drama
Techniques Enhance Teaching
Theatre educator Gai Jones of Ojai
recently received an award for a collaborative paper she wrote entitled "Evaluating
the Present: Envisioning the Future of Theatre Arts Education in California." The
award was given by the American Alliance of Theatre Educators. Former
president of the California Educational Theatre Association, Jones continues
to work with the California Alliance for Arts Education and dance education
advocates to establish a theater and dance credential program for grades
K-12 in California. “Our number two industry is entertainment and it
seems ironic that California does not have a theater credential while
35 other states do,” according to Jones. Click
here to read article.
Stakes
are Raised in Washington State
This school year, strengthening arts
education funding becomes more important, as state law now requires schools
to administer tests measuring whether students are meeting Washington standards
in visual and performing arts. Under state and federal law, the arts are
a core subject for public schools, and educators and experts agree they're
a critical part of a well-rounded education.
Click
here.
Alabama
School Districts Feel the Pinch
Alabama school districts feel the economic pinch as tax revenues decline. "Schools
in Alabama are getting hit hard by falling tax receipts, an early warning
of the vulnerability of poor states during the economic downturn." Michael
Casserly, executive director of the Council of the Great City Schools,
an organization that represents 66 urban school districts across the
country, says, "Cuts are in the multiple hundreds of millions of
dollars. We’re having programs cut, purchases of textbooks deferred,
class sizes increased, programs like art, music and physical education
cut, even more than in the last few years."
Link
Ohio
Governor's Education Plan Includes Creativity
Gov. Ted Strickland
unveiled his "Roadmap for Academic Reforms" which included
several points addressing creativity and the arts. One was “Strategies
to enhance creativity and innovation in the classroom must be encouraged
and developed as an integral part of Ohio's education system to prepare
our students for the 21st century.” Another, “Educating the whole child,
which includes wellness, physical education, emotional development, behavioral
development, academic development, the arts, music, will enhance the
opportunities for student success.” Click
here.
A
Music Teacher's Perspective
A Highline, WA area music teacher offers
an honest assessment of a district’s troubled program and describes the
positive influence of having a strong district arts coordinator. Music
educator and jazz artist Sandra Locklear says, “The bottom line is, that
if we don't provide adequate opportunities for our children to learn and
participate in band, choir and orchestra during the regular school day,
we are depriving them of a great lifelong resource.” Click
here.
Performance
Based Assessment Offers a Good Model for the Arts
The Forum for
Education and Democracy sponsored a briefing on performance-based assessment
in Washington D.C. The purpose of the briefing was to explore how performance
based assessment can improve the conditions for higher-quality teaching and learning
in our nation's schools. Click
here.
Musical
Instrument Training Tied to Higher Verbal Test Scores
Children
who take up an instrument for three years or more outscore those who take
only general music classes, not only in dexterity and listening skills,
but in verbal ability and visual pattern completion, according to researchers
conducting a Harvard University-based study. Students who had played an
instrument longer also increased their scores proportionately, researchers
found. Click
here.
Visual
Thinking Strategies Used in Schools
School districts across the
country are using an art curriculum called Visual Thinking Strategies to
improve critical thinking, language and writing, and academic achievement.
At Harvard University, VTS is studied as a way to make medical students
keener observers and ultimately better diagnosticians and doctors .Click
here to read more.
Conferences, Professional Development
Harvard
Project Zero Author to Present Findings on New Study of Quality
Steve Seidel, Director of Harvard’s Project Zero and Director of the
Arts in Education Program at the Harvard Graduate School of Education,
will present the completed findings of his Wallace-commissioned study,
Qualities of Quality: Excellence in Arts Education and How to Achieve
It. The live online webinar is offered by Americans for the Arts on December
17, 2008 at 2:00 PM EST, 1:00 PM CST, 12:00 PM MST, 11:00 AM PST (90
minutes). For more information and to register, click
here.
Alameda
County Arts Learning Anchor School Conference
Discover and explore
how the arts transform schools. How is arts integration an instructional,
assessment and community building strategy? What is quality arts integration
and where do we see it happening? Where do we fit into a global movement
for building equitable classrooms through arts learning? How can we stay
connected to the bigger picture? Berkeley Art Center, March 7-9, 2009.
For more information click
here.
Resources,
Funding Opportunities
Using
Music to Make a Difference
Doing something noteworthy with music in your
community? DoSomething.org and the GRAMMY Foundation® are looking for young people
who have an idea or existing project that uses music to make a difference. There
will be 20 $500 grants,
5 $3000 grants plus a paid trip to the GRAMMY® Awards.
Application deadline is December 15, 2008. For more information and to apply, click
here.
Summer
Music Institute
The Kennedy Center/National Symphony Orchestra
Summer Music Institute is a 4-week summer music program at the John F.
Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C., for student
instrumentalists. This program is open, by recorded audition, to students
who are seriously considering orchestral music as a career, and are in
grades 9 through 12 or are a college freshman or sophomore. Nominations
are due to California Alliance for Arts Education by January 20, 2009.
To view the 2009 Summer Music Institute application, click
here.
Idyllwild
Arts Academy to Award Scholarships
Idyllwild Arts is looking to grant
talented young students the opportunity to win scholarships to the Visual Art
department through the Me in 2D-A Visual Art Competition and Exhibition. The
top three works of the Me in 2D competition will receive $25,000 scholarship
for Grand Prize, $15,000 for Second Prize and a $10,000 scholarship for Third
Prize. Entries are now being accepted and the deadline for submission is January
15, 2009 at 12:00 midnight PST Click
here for more information.
ArtsEdMail provides all the latest information to connect the Arts Education community in California. Our free e-newsletter is published every two weeks.
We rely on you to support our efforts.
Become an advocate or make a donation today!
Redistribution of this e-mail news bulletin is encouraged.
Copyright. California Alliance for Arts Education.