Where the puck is going to be

By Edward Pauly

As the sage Wayne Grezky observed, "A good hockey player plays where the puck is. A great hockey player plays where the puck is going to be." Where is the puck going to be in arts learning?

The biggest growth area for kids' arts learning is after-school programs.  Working parents demand them and sometimes pay for them; employers and mayors demand them; society is building them every day.  And lots of them use arts learning as a core focus, a recruiting tool, a collection of ways to help kids learn and grow, and a source of joy.  That's where the puck is going.

Can artists and arts organizations skate to where the puck is going to be?  The after-school world is full of part-time job opportunities. It's increasingly where the kids are.  And while some of the scarce after-school minutes are booked for reading and math, there are lots of minutes available for the most creative offers to fill them. The location of this puck isn't hard to predict.  It's right in your community, a short trip from your arts organization.

Low-income parents and kids want after-school programs that emphasize school success - for part of the time, they loudly say in survey after survey.  For the rest of the time, the arts are at the top of their most-wanted list. The demand is there. Are the arts there?

December 4, 2008 5:20 AM | | Comments (9) |

9 Comments

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Very nice information. Keep sharing.

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I couldn't disagree more with these comments. I didn't see anything in the origional post that suggested that out of school time arts instruction should replace in school instruction.

I think pitting in school instruction against out of school time instruction in the arts creates a false dichotomy that has nothing to do with what is good for children. Like intrinsic-vs-instrumental, specialists-vs-teaching artists, sequential arts education-vs-integration, the answer should be both/and NOT either/or.

Children in high resourced suburbs and private schools get ALL of these things. They go to private lessons and ballet classes after school. They learn to use a camera and play the guitar just because they think they might find it of interest. They go to camps in the summer to get better and better at what they are passionate about learning. Why should we expect children in our public inner city schools to go without because we are afraid that another kind of instruction will somehow be diminished or marginalized? As if in the end, one way of getting turned on and receiving instruction is all a child needs to get a quality arts education, or that one way is more important or valuable than another.

If we are serious about leveling the arts learning playing field at a systemic level for students in urban school districts, we can’t afford to ignore the opportunities that out of school time offers us.

Edward, I'll resist responding with a puckish and vulgar pun, so instead I'll just add support to David and Jane on this one. The problem we face is getting and keeping the arts within the school day, with arts as central to education. The arts are relatively thriving in many afterschool and non-school settings.

Ed, I must second David Shookhoff's comment. Once you relegate the arts to second hand status in non-required,non-graded, non sequential and usually non-certified instruction, you've taken the heart out the arts as education for every child.

Moving the arts into the after-school arena poses a serious risk of further marginalization. Administrators struggling to find room for everything in the regular school-day schedule may leap at the idea of relegating arts activities to outside-of-school time slots, thereby precluding the possibility of integrating them with the rest of the teaching and learning that happens between 8:00AM – 3PM. Enlightened principals have in some cases adopted a both/and strategy, scheduling arts classes late in the school day and then extending the work into the after-school time period (often utilizing collaborations between school-based arts teachers and outside providers.) But moving the arts completely out of the school day would be a serious policy mistake. If that’s where the puck is going, let’s get our defense to check it and send it back the other way.

Nice to see a hockey fan among the crowd. The Great One's father, Walter Gretzky, used to tell his son: "I will meet you in the winner's circle."

Go Rangers.

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This Conversation For decades, as teaching of the arts has been cut back in our public schools, alarms have been raised about the dire consequences for American culture. Artists and arts organizations stepped in to try to... more

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comparateur mutuelle senior commented on Where the puck is going to be: Very nice information. Keep sharing....

complementaire sante commented on Where the puck is going to be: Thanks for all the effort spent in making this fabulous blog ! ok,nice one...

mutuelle senior commented on Where the puck is going to be: Very nice information. Keep sharing....

lingerie femme commented on Where the puck is going to be: Very interesting site...

Gigi Antoni commented on Where the puck is going to be: I couldn't disagree more with these comments. I didn't see anything in the ...

Rob Horowitz commented on Where the puck is going to be: Edward, I'll resist responding with a puckish and vulgar pun, so instead I'...

JANE REMER commented on Where the puck is going to be: Ed, I must second David Shookhoff's comment. Once you relegate the arts to ...

David Shookhoff commented on Where the puck is going to be: Moving the arts into the after-school arena poses a serious risk of further...

Richard Kessler commented on Where the puck is going to be: Nice to see a hockey fan among the crowd. The Great One's father, Walter Gr...