The College Board Launches "Arts at the Core" Website with Recommendations for Advancing the State of Arts Education in the 21st Century

Comprised of more than 50 leading educators and artists, the National Task Force on the Arts in Education (NTFAE) was created in 2008 to address the opportunities and challenges facing arts education in the United States. The NTFAE advises the College Board by recommending strategies for placing the arts at the core of elementary, secondary, and postsecondary education. These strategies include:

Researching underserved student populations.

Promoting student creativity.

Understanding the arts in a global perspective.
Integrating the arts into a greater number of College Board programs.
Engaging a greater number of professional artists in arts education.
Building partnerships and affecting policy at the national, state, and local levels.

The NTFAE's report, "Arts at the Core: Recommendations for advancing the state of arts education in the 21st Century" confronts challenges to the state of the arts in education, identifies the many benefits of arts learning, and details eight key recommendations for advancing the place of the arts in American education. It outlines recommendations for making the arts a core component of American education.

For more information, read the brochure and final report, Arts at the Core, available at the link below. This brochure introduces you to the voices and ideas that make up the NTFAE. Learn more about the importance of the arts in education through these essays from leading thinkers and policy makers in arts education.

http://professionals.collegeboard.com/policy-advocacy/access/national-arts-task-force

Another point of view on "Art Expert: The Problem with School Art Programs are Teachers Who "Can Barely Draw"

Art Expert: The Problem With School Art Programs Are Teachers Who "Can Barely Draw"
David C. Levy

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/answer-sheet/guest-bloggers/david-levy-the-problem-with-sc.html#

http://mivpaa.blogspot.com/2009/10/problem-with-school-art-programs-are.html

I am in my ninth year as a high school art teacher. After a twenty-year career in illustration, I went to back to school to receive my teacher certification and a master’s degree in art education. I have to say that the vast majority of art ed students I attended classes with (undergraduate and graduate students alike) had very limited ability in terms of traditional art skills such as realistic drawing and painting. Additionally, I have to say that I have been largely pretty unimpressed with most of the teacher artwork that has been on display at the art education conferences I have attended. In my opinion, David C. Levy’s assertion that “many art teachers can barely draw” is correct.

Mr. Levy cites a number of reasons as to why this is. To him, the main reason is that K-12 visual art instruction focuses on “the nurturing of ‘creativity and self-expression’ at the expense of competence.” This is in large part true, as far as I can tell. The question is, why is this so?

It is my assertion that the reason lies within the realm of art philosophy and art criticism over the last hundred years or more. The modern era brought with it a myriad of changes in not only art, but in Western culture as a whole. World War I spawned DADA, with its outright rejection of tradition; Marcel Duchamp and others created a anti-art/non-art aesthetic/non-aesthetic. The Surrealists, influenced by the work of Sigmund Freud, also turned from tradition, exploring the world of dreams and the subconscious mind. In mid-century, the influential New York art critic Clement Greenberg determined that for art to be ART, it had to always be new and different. Painting was no longer about “making pictures”, it became simply about paint on a flat surface. Initially supported by Greenberg, Willem de Kooning, after painting pure abstraction in the late 1940s, returned to figurative painting with his “Woman” series, and he was essentially rejected by Greenberg as being “old-fashioned”. Never mind that most people today would likely consider de Kooning’s Woman paintings as exceedingly modern, if not downright ugly.

Having passed from Abstract Expressionism through Pop Art and Minimalism, we are now in what many consider to be the Postmodern era in art (and Western culture in general). Art has now gotten to the point where, to many people in the upper echelon of the fine art world, we have moved beyond the “art object” itself, and are into the realm of pure concept. For many in the art world, SKILL IS NO LONGER AN ISSUE. In fact, there is now a whole body of literature on the notion of “deskilling” in art.

One might also look back to the counter-culture revolution of the 1960s, where “do your own thing” was the order of the day. Certainly, many art teachers and post-secondary art educators over the last few decades came from that era, and one could argue that many of them have continued to pass along this mentality to art teachers of more recent years.

Indeed, to many art teachers, art is about “creativity and self-expression”, and it is oftentimes also much about helping students explore and express ideas in the political/social arena—one need only look at an issue of Art Education journal to see that this is the case. Never mind that the sociopolitical themes are heavily leaning in one direction. This is, of course, also true in post-secondary art programs, and in the contemporary art world in general.

Art is about many things nowadays, but in the art world and in K-12 visual art education, it does not seem to be much about skill. K-12 visual art standards and benchmarks are for the most part non-specific and open to interpretation; for example: “Intentionally use art materials and tools effectively to communicate ideas.” How about something like “Demonstrate the ability to draw a properly proportioned human figure”? Not a chance. As Mr. Levy implies, a lot of K-12 art teachers would have difficulty doing this.

Is there a solution? In large part, probably not, given the state of art in general in the postmodern era. For my part, I run a program that places a good amount of emphasis on traditional skills. As I like to say, if you can’t write a decent sentence, how are you going to write a whole story?

One final word: art teachers, if your drawing skills are really weak, try taking a few life drawing classes.

Richard Jacobi
Arts Academy in the Woods
Fraser, Michigan
http://rjart.blogspot.com/

Response to David C. Levy article "But many Art Teachers Can Barely Draw!

The following was submitted in response to David C. Levy's article posted earlier on this blog. Bolded sections refer to statements in Levy's article.

To my associates, the Visual Art Teachers,
10/20/2009


I will address point by point what I view as flaws in David C. Levy's article discussing "But many art teachers can barely draw!".


38 credits of studio instruction

Studio classes consist of 9 hours of studio time for every three hours of credit. While he said that you could take 38 hours in little more than a year (15, 15, 8), it would not be productive nor would any student attempt it, it would mean 135 hours of studio time per week!

Most college majors consist of 30 hours of credit. At Eastern Michigan University, the B.F.A. program consists of 60 hours of Art. The Art Education is an additional 20 hours.


... this precious learning time is generally fractured into a smorgasbord of classes in unrelated media and disciplines

Art students do take a variety of classes but select an area to specialize in. Some are ceramics majors, other are printmakers, others are painters, but no one has a smorgasbord of classes.

Dr. Levy continues to compare Visual Art Education to Music Education and states that this selection of unrelated classes is unacceptable and that
“We would think such an approach absurd.” I believe that your whole approach to the Visual Arts is a bit absurd!

Of course Visual Art teachers can draw, sculpt, create and educate!

As they become adolescents, much of the ingenuousness that underlay their earlier creative spontaneity will automatically disappear; but good art-making skills will stay with them for life and, for some, the creativity will resurface. At this point it should be enhanced by the existence of the technical skills to actualize its full potential.

Yes this is true and it is what every elementary Visual Art educator is attempting it achieve and to a large extent, doing so with a great deal of success.

Consider that we don’t teach elementary school children creative writing;

I really question this, and in fact, encourage creative writing in my Visual Arts classroom, or as I call it, the Art studio. I am sure if you talked to the regular classroom teachers, they would question your assertion.

Most students entering college art departments or even professional art schools bring little more than their elementary and high school art classes as background preparation. And, as we have seen, skill development is often sadly lacking in these settings. (How could it be otherwise, when the majority of their teachers have so few skills of their own to teach?)

Again, another slap in the face of the Visual Arts teachers... shame on you Dr. Levy. Many of the Visual Art departments in colleges and universities require a portfolio of the students work and interviews to be accepted. High school teachers spend considerable time preparing students for application and provide portfolio production classes or after school assistance.

Visual Art students need to know how to draw to get in the door! It is like saying a music student went to college to study music because he/she liked the sound of the french horn! This is absurdity!

By contrast, the serious music student has probably had ten or more years of private study with a competent professional as well as participation in advanced school music programs, community orchestras and the like,

Ten or more years of private study? Well of course this student does have an advantage, but what about the other music students? What are their options and future in Music education?


even in the most selective of art schools the freshman year (or as it is often called, the “Foundation Year”) is essentially remedial. It does exactly what its name implies – lays down a visual arts foundation that should have been built years before.

Again, a true lack of respect for the Visual Arts teachers. As stated previously, Visual Art students need to present a quality portfolio to be accepted.

One might hope that even if the elementary schools are not doing their job, an interested and/or talented student would have an opportunity to develop visual skills at the high school level.

The elementary schools are doing their job in teaching Visual Art and encourage students to continue in middle school (a level that Dr. Levy seems to forget) and hopefully in high school.

most laymen are incapable of telling good drawing from bad, have little sense of composition or design and, in fact, don’t much care.

It appears that according to Dr. Levy, only a select few are capable of discerning the true effectiveness of quality visual art. As I used to tell my friends who questioned Art in school, “What would your sports car look like if it wasn’t designed by an artist?” Of course the layperson is capable of identifying and selecting quality Art, and they do care!

Regrettably, I have no answers. This is a gloomy picture and is likely to remain so. The miracle is that even without the enlightened interest and support of the educational community or the mainstream American public we continue to produce talented, skilled and creative visual artists.


Regrettably I had to listen to you trash the abilities of qualified people in the Visual Arts while still supporting the Music education. We are the Arts, both music and the visual field. True you have a greater resume than me and are able to identify various studies (without being specific to their source. But IF you are so qualified, why don’t you have the answers?

I do believe that yes we can draw and sculpt and paint and photograph and create digital art and effectively demonstrate for our students, and encourage and inspire and develop our future artists... and not accept your opinion especially without any clear direction to eliminate the so called “gloomy picture”.

As I said earlier, your resume is quite impressive although I couldn’t find it on the internet, but my question is, can you draw or play music? I assume you to be quite proficient given your ability to draw opinions on the talents of others.


We all need to work together to help our students, negative attitudes do nothing to solve the problems we all face given the economy of today. All Art is important to the future but questioning the abilities of the teachers displays a lack of respect, which is always present in my Art Studio.


Respectfully submitted,


Jim Schulz
Elementary Art Teacher
Haisley Elementary School
Ann Arbor Public Schools

The Problem With School Art Programs Are Teachers Who "Can Barely Draw"

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/answer-sheet/guest-bloggers/david-levy-the-problem-with-sc.html#

Hand wringing among the enlightened has been a fairly standard response to the widespread practice of cutting the arts first – especially the visual arts -- when school budgets start crunching.

The arts community usually counters this ritual by references to data that show the positive effect of arts instruction on learning in “core” academic subjects. Though intellectually sound, this tactic has been sadly ineffective. It is also unfortunate that in order to make their case, arts advocates have found it necessary to piggyback on English or math rather than come right out with the plain fact that the arts are critically important to a civilized society.

Many believe that the repeated bloodletting of arts curricula in our schools is a reflection of community values in which the arts rank very poorly; perhaps a legacy from our iconoclastic 17th century forebears as well as the outcome of general disbelief in the arts’ relevance to intellectual and academic growth.
I would argue, however, that there is another reason why the arts, and visual arts in particular, are an endangered species in American K – 12 education.
It has been my observation that primary and secondary school art teachers rank very low on the continuum of professional respect among their peers.
And I would posit as a significant cause that they have generally not achieved a sufficient level of skill in their discipline to deserve that respect. For example, while English teachers may not be able to write The Great American Novel, the chances are pretty good that they can compose a competent essay. But many art teachers can barely draw!

This, however, is really not their fault.
A survey of undergraduate art education curricula leading to teacher certification in the U.S. will show that few exceed 38 credits of studio instruction. In other words, the aggregated exposure to art-making by students in these programs adds up to just a tad more than one year.
What is worse, rather then comprising a progressively developing, skill- and concept-building sequence, this precious learning time is generally fractured into a smorgasbord of classes in unrelated media and disciplines -- presumably so teachers can respond to diverse areas of student interest.
The result is a curriculum shaped by a pastiche of courses; e.g., one in ceramics, another in printmaking, a course or two in drawing, painting or sculpture, digital arts, etc. So the majority of K-12 art teachers graduate without rigorous training in the fundamental skills that underpin competence in their discipline.
They haven’t been taught to draw, they barely understand the nuances of spatial organization, color or design, and their ability to produce a professional or even semi-professional art product is de minimis.

Compare this to music education. Would we take a program seriously that proposed to transform 18-year-olds, with only a rudimentary exposure to music, into music teachers after a year and a half of instruction in which each class was devoted to a different instrument?

The answer, of course, is a resounding “no!” We would think such an approach absurd.
But since this is, in fact, the way we prepare our art teachers, why should the educational community value their contribution, when it has so little potential to bring excellence to the table (notwithstanding that, amazingly and as the studies show, the exposure itself appears to have salutary consequences for the academic curriculum)?

How has this come about? How has a profession that was valued and whose skills were rigorously taught by western cultures and their educational systems for centuries fallen to such low regard?

I believe that much of the answer lies in the fact that since the early 20th century K -12 visual arts education in the U.S. and to some degree globally, has been based on fundamentally misguided principles.

The most saliently destructive of these is the belief that art classes for pre-pubescent children should emphasize the nurturing of “creativity and self expression” at the expense of competence. This is reinforced by the erroneous notion that skill development, especially in pre-adolescent kids, is at best irrelevant and at worst, an inhibitor to children’s creative self-expression.
Nothing could be further from the truth.

Young kids before the age of puberty and its accompanying onset of adolescent self-consciousness are instinctively, often irrepressibly, creative.
What they need in their art classes is a foundation of skill building to make the fullest expression of those creative instincts possible.

As they become adolescents, much of the ingenuousness that underlay their earlier creative spontaneity will automatically disappear; but good art-making skills will stay with them for life and, for some, the creativity will resurface. At this point it should be enhanced by the existence of the technical skills to actualize its full potential.

Consider that we don’t teach elementary school children creative writing; we teach them reading, spelling and basic syntax. The visual arts have equivalent fundamentals but we are not bringing them into the classroom.

Again, look at music. Kids start playing an instrument early in life and steadily develop their physical, technical and perceptual musical strengths as they grow into adulthood. In the visual arts the physical requirements are somewhat different, but in general they are more similar then not, and the perceptual issues of eye training and visual judgment are corollaries for hearing, understanding structure and interpreting music.

Therefore, it is just as absurd to suggest that a competent art teacher can be produced through only a year-and-a-half of hands-on study in a peripatetic curriculum as it is to assert that music teachers can be produced in a program that sets out to teach them five or six instruments in that same period of time. [Author] Malcolm Gladwell’s 10,000-hour rule may not fully apply here, but it is certainly food for thought.

The argument might be made that like young musicians, serious art students enter college after many years of skill building. Unfortunately, this is not true!
Most students entering college art departments or even professional art schools bring little more than their elementary and high school art classes as background preparation. And, as we have seen, skill development is often sadly lacking in these settings. (How could it be otherwise, when the majority of their teachers have so few skills of their own to teach?)

By contrast, the serious music student has probably had ten or more years of private study with a competent professional as well as participation in advanced school music programs, community orchestras and the like, where technical skills, musical sophistication and competition are the sine qua non. Think about the criteria for participation in All State bands or the demanding meritocracy that determines admission to the elite musical ensembles in a large suburban high school. These have no visual arts equivalents.

A revealing comparison is that students entering good music conservatories quickly embark on the development of a professional repertoire, music theory and advanced technique. By contrast, even in the most selective of art schools the freshman year (or as it is often called, the “Foundation Year”) is essentially remedial. It does exactly what its name implies – lays down a visual arts foundation that should have been built years before.

One might hope that even if the elementary schools are not doing their job, an interested and/or talented student would have an opportunity to develop visual skills at the high school level.

To a limited degree this is true, especially in well-off suburban communities or urban magnet schools and there are other exceptions.

But by and large, even in schools where the art departments have not been slashed and burned by successive budget cuts, the teachers themselves simply do not have sufficient training to understand and foster the skills their students need.
Again a music analogy: Most people can tell in a heartbeat whether or not a kid can play an instrument at a basic level of competence. Since the days of Jack Benny the sound of a scratchy violin or caterwauling saxophone practiced in the bedroom has been the stuff of a thousand sit-coms.

By contrast, most laymen are incapable of telling good drawing from bad, have little sense of composition or design and, in fact, don’t much care. Extrapolated to teachers whose actual exposure to studio arts has consisted of 38 or fewer credits spread across multiple and unrelated art disciplines, it is simply unreasonable to expect them to be able to recognize technical deficiencies or needs, much less correct them. If you can’t see it, you can fix it. And worse, if you can see it but don’t know how to do it, you can’t guide a student effectively towards solving visual problems.

It is hard to say just where to go from here. Certainly there is no quick fix. Given the entrenchment of college and university art education faculties with a vested interest in the status quo, coupled with the myopic licensing requirements for art teachers in most states, the possibility of reform at the college level is remote.
Yet this is the sine qua non for the solution. And even if reform were miraculously to occur overnight, the education of a new breed of art teachers and their gradual infiltration into schools that are already resistant to the arts, particularly the visual arts would be a painfully slow process.

Regrettably, I have no answers. This is a gloomy picture and is likely to remain so. The miracle is that even without the enlightened interest and support of the educational community or the mainstream American public we continue to produce talented, skilled and creative visual artists.

Their success in this challenging cultural environment is a ray of bright light -- a tribute to their force of will and indomitable spirit. It is an achievement well worth celebration and support.

But just as literature is meaningless in a society of illiterates, artists can only expect a capricious and non-critical audience in a culture whose educational system places no value on the teaching of their craft.

David C. Levy is president of the Cambridge Information Group’s Education division. He is the former president and director of the Corcoran Gallery of Art (Washington’s largest private cultural institution) and its College of Art and Design. As chancellor of New School University, he founded the New School for Jazz and Contemporary Music. He was also director of Parsons School of Design, founder of the Delaware College of Art and Design in Wilmington, and is now a principal in Bach to Rock music schools.

Wharton Center Renovation Includes New Education Spaces

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GsdbkCGnMEw

ASCD and Edutopia on Innovative teaching method that uses arts, and looping to improve student achievement

Innovative teaching method uses arts, looping to improve achievement

A California educator is praising a teaching method that integrates the arts into lessons and allows students to learn at their own pace. The practice, known as the Waldorf methods, lets students connect poems and songs to numbers and letters, and teachers alternate monthly between teaching about numbers and teaching about letters -- a practice designed to boost students' long-term memory. Teachers also move with their students as they advance through grades, a practice called looping.

http://www.edutopia.org/waldorf-public-school-morse

Video: Day in the Life | Interlochen Center for the Arts

Feed their passions and they will thrive! Watch this short video which follows an Interlochen Camp student through a typical day filled with singing, choral music, and organ.

Video: Day in the Life | Interlochen Center for the Arts

Shared via AddThis

August 18-20 Creativity in the Classroom - Register today at: www.gomiem.org

Pocket Universes - Video landscapes for contemplation

David W. Gray of Xplane posted a series of Pocket Universes, self-contained video clips that can be looped continuously. Like landscapes, they are tiny reflections of the world and objects for contemplation.

Imagine the possibilities....

To see some of Gray's, click here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/davegray/3698738372/

Arts NAEP June 2009 Press Conference

Announcement of the Nation's Report Card Arts 2008 Visual Arts and music.
Eileen Weiser, former State Board of Education member, participated in this video release.

Dana Foundation: Educators schooled by ‘guerilla artist,’ DreamWorks executive

“I was one the system failed,” self-styled “guerilla artist” and high-school dropout Keri Smith warned a crowd of teachers assembled May 5 at Baltimore's American Visionary Art Museum. “I was the rebel, the one who stayed in the back and snuck out for cigarettes.”

In high school, she explained, her classes, filled with teachers who focused on technical
skills and accurate landscapes, were stifling. So she couldn't wait to get home, where she could actually “create something.”

To read more about the Dana Foundation's “Arts, Creativity and Other Outrageous Ideas” go to:
http://www.dana.org/news/features/detail.aspx?id=21760

The Intersection of Islam, America and Identity

Exhibit focusses on art by Islamic women in the U.S.

Huffington Post: Part II Why arts education is a matter of social justice and why it will save the world

Lucia Brawley continues to build her case saying, "we must improve our education overall, including in the fields of
science, technology and engineering. But we must also remain ever
cognizant of our national genius -- characterized by independent
thinking and improvisation. There is no better training ground for
creativity, spontaneity, effective communication, and an understanding
of difference -- in other words, all the skills necessary for us to
perform in a global future -- than in the humanities and all of the
arts."

To read Part 2 of this 2-part series, click here.

Huffington Post: Part I - Why Arts Education is a matter of social justice and why it will save the world

Lucia Brawley, actress, writer and political organizer, examines what we must do to convince powers that be that arts education is not a luxury reserved for fat times, but a necessity that will ultimately help us thrive as a culture, as a community, as a competitor in the global marketplace and as a leading collaborator in the stewardship of our world. AKA art saves lives.

To read Part I of her 2-part series go to: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lucia-brawley/mordecais-metamorphosis-w_b_185903.html

visual note-taking www.austinkleon.com

Bill Strickland on redemption through arts, music, and unlikely partnerships at TED

Potentially one of the Rust Belt's Casualties, Bill Strickland tells a tale of redemption through arts, music, and unlikely partnerships at TED

As a Pittsburgh youth besieged by racism in the crumbling remains of the steel economy, Bill Strickland should have been one of the Rust Belt's casualties. Instead, he discovered the potter's wheel, and the transforming power of fountains, irrepressible dreams, and the slide show.

Why you should listen to him:

Bill Strickland's journey from at-risk youth to 1996 MacArthur "Genius" grant recipient would be remarkable in itself, if it were not overshadowed by the staggering breadth of his vision. While moonlighting as an airline pilot, Strickland founded Manchester Bidwell, a world-class institute in his native Pittsburgh devoted to vocational instruction in partnership with big business -- and, almost incidentally, home to a Grammy-winning record label and a world-class jazz performance series. Yet its emphasis on the arts is no accident, as it embodies Strickland's conviction that an atmosphere of high culture and respect will energize even the most troubled students.

With job placement rates that rival most universities, Manchester Bidwell's success has attracted the attention of everyone from George Bush, Sr. (who appointed Strickland to a six-year term on the board of the NEA) to Fred Rogers (who invited Strickland to demonstrate pot throwing on Mister Rogers' Neighborhood). And though cumbersome slide trays have been replaced by PowerPoint, the inspirational power of his speeches and slide shows are the stuff of lecture circuit legend.

"With his potter's hands, Bill Strickland is reshaping the business of social change. His Pittsburgh-based program offers a national model for education, training and hope."

Fast Company

To hear Bill Strickland’s story, click here.

Daniel Pink on Pecha 20 slides 20 second Pecha Kucha

To view Daniel Pink's 20 slide 20 second Pecha Kucha on Pecha Kuchas, click here.

Let us now bullet-point our praise for Mark Dytham and Astrid Klein, two Tokyo-based architects who have turned PowerPoint, that fixture of cubicle life, into both art form and competitive sport. Their innovation, dubbed pecha-kucha (Japanese for "chatter"), applies a simple set of rules to presentations: exactly 20 slides displayed for 20 seconds each. That's it. Say what you need to say in six minutes and 40 seconds of exquisitely matched words and images and then sit the hell down. The result, in the hands of masters of the form, combines business meeting and poetry slam to transform corporate clich into surprisingly compelling beat-the-clock performance art.

The duo — Dytham is British, Klein Italian — invented pecha-kucha four years ago to help revive a struggling performance space they owned. The first presentations were such a hit that they began hosting monthly pecha-kucha events, boozy affairs at which Tokyo architects and designers showcased their streamlined offerings to crowds of hundreds. Now there are pecha-nights in 80 cities, from Amsterdam and Atlanta to San Francisco and Shanghai. Why? Dytham believes that the rules have a liberating effect. "Suddenly," he says, "there's no preciousness in people's presentations." Just poetry.

By Dan Pink | Wired Magazine Issue 15.09

Arne Duncan on the arts - a critical component of a complete education

"I am greatly honored that the Department is hosting the National PTA's student art exhibit. The students in this show, like many, many others around the country and the world, represent the talent and thoughtful, artistic work that can result from the support of their schools, teachers, and families. The arts are a critical component of a complete education, providing an opportunity to see and think in new ways and to innovate, as this exhibit proves. The theme of this year's exhibit--'I Can Make a Difference by ...', is an inspiration to all of us to engage, as these students have done, in the kind of thinking and efforts that President Obama has asked us to do as citizens of this great nation."

-- Arne Duncan, on occasion of the opening of the National PTA's "Reflections" art exhibit at the Department of Education, Feb. 10, 2009.

Creativity Food and Science - Ferran Adria

He's been called the Salvador Dali of the kitchen and graced the covers of The New York Times Magazine, Rolling Stone Magazine and Time. He was brought in by Harvard's School of Engineering and Applied Sciences yet considers himself an artist. Read this case study on his creative process published by the ESADE School of Business:

http://www.elbulli.com/esade/Caso_Ferran_Adria_and_elBulli-ESADE_en.pdf

A MIssing Piece in the Economic Stimulus: Hobbling the Arts Hobbles Innovation

By Michele and Robert Root-Bernstein on February 11, 2009 in Imagine That!

As the economy stumbles, the first things to get cut at the national, state, and local levels are the arts. The first thing that goes in our school curricula are the arts. Arts, common wisdom tells us, are luxuries we can do without in times of crisis. Or can we?

Let's see what happens when we start throwing out all the science and technology that the arts have made possible.

You may be shocked to find that you'll have to do without your cell phone or PDA. In the first place, it uses a form of encryption called frequency hopping to ensure your messages can't easily be intercepted. Frequency hopping was invented by American composer George Antheil in collaboration with the actress Hedy Lamarr. Yeah, really.

Next, the electronic screen that displays your messages (and those on your computer and TV) employ a combination of red, green, and blue dots from which all the different colors can be generated. That innovation was the collaboration of a series of painter-scientists (including American physicist Ogden Rood and Nobel laureate Wilhelm Ostwald) and post-impressionist artists like Seurat - you know, the guy who painted his pictures out of dots of color, just like the ones in your electronic devices. The programming inside owes its existence to J. M. Jacquard, a weaver, who invented programmable looms using punch cards. Exactly the same technique was borrowed to program the first computers and is incorporated into modern programming languages.

Then there are all those computer chips running our critical devices. They're made using a combination of three classic artistic inventions: etching, silk screen printing, and photolithography. Add to that the fact that data from NASA and NSA satellites is enhanced using artistic techniques such as chiaroscuro (a Renaissance invention) and false coloring (invented by Fauvist painters) to increase contrast so it's easier to perceive important information.(Parenthetically, artists also figured out how to hide information. Camouflage was invented by the American painter Abbot Thayer and during WWI the Vorticists in England and the Cubists in France were co-opted by their governments to design prints to protect troops, equipment, and planes.) Hey, the arts look pretty useful, huh?

That's only the beginning. In medicine, the stitches that permit a surgeon to correct an aneurysm or carry out a transplant were invented by American Nobel laureate Alexis Carrel, who took his knowledge of lace making into the operating room. Alexander Fleming discovered the antibiotic penicillin while gathering beautifully colored microbes for his (rather unusual) hobby of "painting" with microorganisms. Pacemakers are simple modifications of musical metronomes. If you have a neurological deficit, your neurologist may employ dance notation to analyze your problem. Physicians at Harvard, the University of Pennsylvania, and other major medical centers are trained by actors to interact humanely with you as a patient. These same physicians may learn to observe your symptoms more closely by being taught to draw, paint or photograph, or through art appreciation courses. Many hospitals employ music to relieve stress in operating rooms and post-operatively. Painting, drawing and sculpting are also used to treat depression and other psychiatric disorders. Indeed, our own institution, Michigan State University, originated music therapy as a way to treat soldiers suffering from what we now call post-traumatic stress disorder.

Oh, and that bridge you may drive over on the way to work? Princeton engineering professor David Billington and Smithsonian historian of technology Brooke Hindle have demonstrated that most innovations in bridge design originated with artistically trained engineers such as John Roebling and Robert Maillart. They're part of a long tradition of American artist-inventors. You may not know that Samuel Morse (to whom we owe the telegraph) and Robert Fulton (to whom we owe the steam ship) were two of the most prominent 19th century American artists before they turned to inventing -- visit the Smithsonian American Art Galleries some time and see for yourself. Alexander Graham Bell was a pianist whose invention of the telephone began with a simple musical game. Buckminster Fuller's geodesic domes don't just provide us with unusual architectures, they also inform our understanding of cell and virus structure and permit new biomedical insights. Kenneth Snelson's tensegrity sculptures (stroll past his "Needle Tower" outside the Hirshhorn Museum & Sculpture Garden on the Washington Mall) aren't just fascinating constructions in and of themselves, they've also created a whole new form of engineering. Google it!

The fact is that the arts foster innovation. We've just published a study that shows that almost all Nobel laureates in the sciences actively engage in arts as adults. They are twenty-five times as likely as the average scientist to sing, dance, or act; seventeen times as likely to be a visual artist; twelve times more likely to write poetry and literature; eight times more likely to do woodworking or some other craft; four times as likely to be a musician; and twice as likely to be a photographer. Many connect their art to their scientific ability with some riff on Nobel prizewinning physicist Max Planck words: "The creative scientist needs anartistic imagination."

Bottom line: Successful scientists and inventors are artistic people. Hobble the arts and you hobble innovation. It's a lesson our legislators need to learn. So feel free to cut and paste this column into a letter to your senators and congressmen, as well as your school representatives, or simply send them a link to this column. One way or another, if we as a society wish to cultivate creativity, the arts MUST be part of the equation!

Middle School Creative Imaging Lego Mission Impossible Animation

CNNMoney.Com on Stimulus Package Funding for Education Technology

Obama's school patchwork project

President-elect wants to repair and modernize schools for the 21st century. But experts worry the plan is too small and short-sighted.

By David Goldman, CNNMoney.com staff writer

January 15, 2009: 12:48 PM ET

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- President-elect Barack Obama has proposed an ambitious plan to rebuild the nation's crumbling schools as a part of his economic stimulus package, aiming to help budget-constrained school districts make much needed repairs.

The current stimulus bill facing a House vote includes as much as $120 billion for public school systems, $14 billion of which would go to fix leaky roofs and boilers, install new windows and bring buildings up to a level of acceptable repair. A billion dollars would also go to modernize classrooms, providing students access to 21st century technology,like broadband Internet, computers and state-of-the-art lab facilities.

The aim: provide a positive educational environment for students and teachers and create new jobs. But it likely won't be enough to achieve either goal.

The state of the country's 97,000 public school buildings is dire. They are overcrowded, use outdated technology and are in great disrepair, especially in the nation's poorest communities. Somewhere between $100 billion and $360 billion is needed to repair and modernize schools, according to various estimates.

"There is a huge backlog of public school repair projects," said Ross Eisenbrey, vice president of the Economic Policy Institute. "The need is gigantic and almost everywhere - few school districts don't have a maintenance backlog."

Over the past few years, and especially in the more current challenging economic times, budgets have been strained and school districts have had to make cuts. As schools trim non-essential expenses, they have slashed their maintenance budgets from about 12% to 9% of their total expenses. The cutbacks were exacerbated, some say, by class-size reductions mandated in the No Child Left Behind laws.

"Class-size reduction had the biggest impact, because you need to fund the hiring of new teachers," said Mary Filardo, Executive Director of 21st Century School Fund. "Directed stimulus is really needed; otherwise school districts would continue to spend on in-house salaries, not on construction."

Too much with too little: A diluted impact

But experts worry that the plan tries to do too much with too little money, and will have only a small impact in the short-term. Obama wants to both fix schools and rapidly create jobs with stimulus, but most of the projects that can be started immediately are small repairs, not the larger modernization jobs that would have a more long-lasting impact on schools.

"Is the intent of this program to deal with schools' issues or economic stimulus?" asked David Shreve, education policy analyst at the National Conference of State Legislatures. "By focusing on two purposes, they run the risk of diluting each one."

Furthermore, some analysts are concerned about how the money will distributed. Despite several attempts to pinpoint which schools need the most funds for repairs, Filardo said no good assessment exists.

To address that issue, the House has divided up the allocations: $13 billion to Title I, the proxy the government uses to determine the school districts with the highest need for academic improvement; $13 billion to the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act; $14 billion to a new school modernization and repair program, $1 billion to an education technology program, and as much as $79 billion to state legislatures. Still, some say the government should simply focus on the poorest communities - which are in most need of school repair and jobs.

Though the need for school funding is greater than the$120 billion that the stimulus has pledged, some say as little as $10 billion would still get the ball rolling. Once the economy gets back in shape, experts say states and school districts will be able to continue the funding efforts that the federal government began.

"It will certainly serve its purpose: a stimulus to to get things going," said Bob Canavan, chairman of Rebuild America's Schools Coalition.

Building 21st century schools

Economists say as many as 150,000 jobs could be created from the proposed school building plan, since about 10,000 jobs could be created for every billion dollars spent on schools. Half of those jobs would probably be in construction. Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., a leading advocate of school and education stimulus, has said job-creation figures may be triple that level.

Obama said eliminating the backlog of infrastructure projects will do more than just create jobs; it will help the next generation of Americans succeed in the future.

"To give our children the chance to live out their dreams in a world that's never been more competitive, we will equip tens of thousands of schools, community colleges, and public universities with 21st century classrooms, labs, and libraries," Obama said last week in a speech about stimulus.

The nation's teachers began lobbying hard for school repair and modernization since Obama made his announcement last week, arguing that crumbling schools have had difficulty attracting and keeping teachers.

"Teachers can't teach in overcrowded classrooms in which you have to wear a coat to stay warm," said Janet Bass, spokeswoman for the American Federation of Teachers. "We have to make schools conducive to teaching and learning, and we absolutely think that part of the economic stimulus package should go to building and modernizing schools."

Tim Magner, director of the U.S. Department of Education's technology division, said providing students with new, advanced technology will allow schools to use more up-to-date and innovative teaching methods that will narrow America's education gap with the rest of the world.

"By using efficient information-delivering technology at schools, students can learn problem-solving and collaboration - the kinds of skills that are difficult to export and are in high demand today," he said.

Analysts, policy makers and politicians agree that if the government gets it right, stimulus could help transform learning environments, giving American students a leg up in the years to come.

"We'll provide new computers, new technology, and new training for teachers," Obama said, "so that students in Chicago and Boston can compete with kids in Beijing for the high-tech, high-wage jobs of the future."

The question remains, if they build an improved education technology infrastructure, will arts educators use it?

New book presents scientific evidence on the importance of play and playful learning to achievement

New book provides scientific evidence on the importance of play and playful learning to achievement

A Mandate for Playful Learning in Preschool: Presenting the Evidence [Oxford University Press, 2009 ---

Available now: http://www.mandateforplayfullearning.com/buynow.html

or

http://www.oup.com/us/catalog/general/subject/Psychology/Developmental/~~/dmlldz11c2EmY2k9OTc4MDE5NTM4MjcxNg

Kathy Hirsh-Pasek, Temple University

Roberta Michnick Golinkoff, University of Delaware

Laura E. Berk, Illinois State University

Dorothy G. Singer, Yale University

With foreword by Dr. Edward F. Zigler

Executive Summary

Play has become a 4-letter word. In an effort to give children a head start on academic skills like reading and mathematics, play is discouraged and didactic learning is stressed. This book presents the scientific evidence in support of three points: 1) Children need both unstructured free play and playful learning under the gentle guidance of adults to best prepare them for entrance into formal school; 2) academic and social development are so inextricably intertwined that the former must not trump attention to the latter; and 3) learning and play are not incompatible; learning takes place best when children are engaged and enjoying themselves.

The argument is organized into three chapters. The first describes the current crisis in preschool education and suggests that the lack of attention to play and playful learning lies at its core. We propose that there exists a false and counterproductive dichotomy between play on the one hand and learning on the other. This dichotomy is echoed in society at large as parents are influenced by the media and the marketplace to buy "educational" toys and restrict free play. While supporting the need for accountability and assessment, we suggest that the current emphasis on assessment in higher grades has lead to narrowly defined curricula objectives in the preschool. Curriculum development has been more responsive to the practical constraints of assessment than to the findings of evidence-based pedagogy.

The second chapter presents the evidence that play and playful learning enhance academic, social, and emotional outcomes in preschool. Playful learning, and not drill-and-practice, engages and motivates children in ways that enhance developmental outcomes and life-long learning. After defining play and playful learning, we examine assumptions about how children learn and suggest that preschools are no longer teaching the "whole" child. The weight of the evidence, from random assignment to correlational to intervention studies, suggests that both free play and playful learning create optimal environments for achievement. Additionally, children in developmentally appropriate classrooms often show less anxiety and stronger social skills.

The epilogue moves from data to application, presenting seven principles that are derived from the science that inform preschool pedagogy. These principles reflect consensus across the learning sciences for how children learn best. If followed, these principles can contribute to the creation of preschools that will be equipped to educate the work force and citizenry for this new century.

Finally, the book ends with a set of recommendations for policy-makers. These recommendations are designed to translate the findings from the research into building excellent preschool programs that encourage family and community participation.

If we hope to prepare intelligent, socially skilled, creative thinkers for the global workplace of tomorrow, we must return play and playful learning to their rightful position in children's lives.

---------------------------------

Available now: http://www.mandateforplayfullearning.com/buynow.html or http://www.oup.com/us/catalog/general/subject/Psychology/Developmental/~~/dmlldz11c2EmY2k9OTc4MDE5NTM4MjcxNg==

---------------------------------

ISBN13: 9780195382716ISBN10: 0195382714 paper, 144 pages Sep 2008, In Stock - Price: $19.95 (05)

March 16-20 2009 Michigan Virtual Arts & Cultural Advocacy Conference

Register Now for the 2009 Virtual Arts & Cultural Advocacy Conference

Register now to participate in the first ever Virtual Arts & Cultural Advocacy Conference held entirely on your computer!

Attendees will have access to the following:

• Legislative meetings scheduled by ArtServe and held in your area
• Live and pre-recorded keynote address
• More than TEN live or pre-recorded breakout sessions consisting of arts education and arts & cultural advocacy.
• 2009 Public Policy Toolkit and the 2009 Arts Education Public Policy Toolkit
• Access to all material for 3 weeks

Visit www.artservemichigan.org/artserve to learn more about the conference

What: 2009 Virtual Arts & Cultural Advocacy Conference

When: Legislative Meetings - March 16^th and 20^th -- Conference Center Open March 17^th-19^th

Note: All live material is recorded and archived meaning that you don't have to make yourself available for all 3 days of the conference.

Where: Your computer! No software to download.

Cost: $30 per person. Discounted group rates will be available for groups of three or more and can be obtained by contacting Mike Latvis at mike@artservemichigan.org or 248-379-5897.

To Register:

• Click button below or visit www.miartsadvocacy.org
• Once page loads click "Skip Intro" at the top left of the page.
• Click on "Register Now" at the bottom right
• Include required information and pay via Google Checkout
• Confirmation will follow via email

Former bankers turn to a creative plan B

NYTimes article on the move from finances to creative endeavors. "The bright spot that Mr. Bowles sees is for the free agent. 'There’s a good chance,' he said, 'that there will be more work for independent contractors and freelancers.'

WHILE most bankers and lawyers who pursue careers in comedy, writing and filmmaking say they are somewhat anomalous, the situation could change quickly."