That's right, New York City's LaGuardia High School of Music and Arts and Performing Arts (that's a mouthful) has cancelled its spring musical due to budget cuts.NY Times: Cuts Imperil a Real High School Musical … [Read more...]

One of the things I had hoped to do with Dewey21C was to capture news items related to arts education that might not make it to artsjournal.com's headlines section. Here's one for you.No matter what the ideal many people would like to see, arts education is provided by any number of people, in a variety of ways, including arts teachers, classroom and subject area teachers, teaching artists, parents, and volunteers; it's the way things have developed (see Big Bang post).So, when you read this article, it's all the more important to consider that … [Read more...]

When I read about the closing of the Picower Foundation, it just plain took my breath away. A few days earlier, it was the JEHT Foundation, and while JEHT didn't support arts education, it was truly one of the most important, leading funders of human rights anywhere in America. They both fell victim to the Madoff scandal--The $50 billion Ponzi scheme.Picower I knew well. The Center for Arts Education had been supported generously by Picower for a number of years. They were a tough group of grantmakers, who asked difficult questions, did some … [Read more...]

A month or so ago I wrote about cuts to the New York State Council on the Arts, as proposed by Governor Paterson. The cuts fell through at that time, due to political wrangling related to which party would be in the majority when, in the New York State Senate. A convoluted sentence for a convoluted occurrence. And, a long story. This week the Governor announced a proposed cut of 20 percent to NYSCA for next year's budget, as well as calling again for a $7 million mid-year cut, which due to the timing of the mid-year cut, would make the cut in a … [Read more...]

Once upon a time, most public schools had substantial arts education, with music and art most often recognized as the formal, official art forms. Dance and theater more often appeared as extracurricular activities, i.e., drama club. For many, many years, classroom teachers were expected to be able to teach the art forms. Primary school teachers were required to have a rudimentary knowledge of the piano, and teach dance, art, music, and drama in grades K-6. Many systems did not offer arts specialists licenses in the primary grades until the late … [Read more...]

I am thrilled to present my first guest blogger on Dewey21c: David Shookhoff. His biography appears at the bottom of this post, but I want to add my own quick thought about David: I can't think of any one person in the very large arts education community in New York City that has been more influential with more people than David Shookhoff. So, I thought it was quite fitting that he be the first guest blogger. Widening Perspective to Narrow the GapBy David Shookhoff Last week Arts Journal hosted a debate on the question, "Will our culture … [Read more...]

Sunday's New York Times had a very interesting article about Scarsdale High School dropping its Advanced Placement Courses, which many had complained were overly reliant on rote memorization, with something called Advanced Topics. In addition, a handful of select private schools have abolished their Advanced Placement Courses, and paid $40,000 a piece to have Ivy League professors develop their Advanced Topics Courses. Also mentioned in this article is a network of public and private high schools which do not "teach to the test."  The … [Read more...]

Okay, it's back to Dewey21c, in the long shadow of the five-day online discussion about arts education. In the next couple of days, my first guest blogger will appear. I am lining others up as well...I wanted to get back on track with my regular blog by moving fairly far afield from the topics covered in the discussion.Years ago, there were two tracks in high school: academic and vocational-technical (Vo-Tech). Actually, there was a third track: drop-out. Some argue there still is that third track, although years ago not much attention was … [Read more...]

When I was working as an arts education consultant in the early 90s, during pretty difficult fiscal times for schools, principals were focused on integrating the arts across the curriculum. I know this, because during this period I was involved in focus groups and interviews with hundreds of principals and school district officials across the country.It was pretty simple: principals didn't have the money nor inclination to hire certified arts teachers. Instead, they looked to utilizing existing staff for the teaching of the arts. At the primary … [Read more...]

I can't tell you how many times I have heard supporters of arts education say: "we need a research project that will prove beyond any doubt what we already know about the benefits of arts education. Then we will really make headway."It's the silver bullet theory. In this case, it's the incontrovertible piece of research that will flip the switch. The silver bullet theory has been at play in the movements: small schools, charter schools, vouchers, accountability, etc.Okay, here's Diane Ravitch taking on the silver bullet theory that the Gates … [Read more...]