An Important Beginning

By Jane Remer

Moy, it is good to hear that Eric, you and your foundation are interested in carrying this conversation forward. I gather from other posts that others would be interested, too. The question is how best to do this. And of course, what is the this. Many agendas have surfaced over the last four days; we dealt fairly quickly with the Rand agenda at first, and then moved on to more general issues about arts education survival and the need for change in the status quo.

I think almost everyone blogging want to see arts education survive and thrive. The question is what are the best strategies to accomplish that end, and on that there is not much agreement among the current group.

I would hope that tomorrow folks might weigh in on what they think are good next steps. It would be a shame to see the momentum of this exchange die, without a trace.

December 4, 2008 7:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) |

2 Comments

By Lindsay Price on December 5, 2008 2:35 PM

The talk has been good. Thank you for offering this debate and thank you to the bloggers who took part. It seemed that everyone took their job seriously and with pride, which doesn't always happen.

I do agree though that while talk it good, 'what do we do' is a vital, necessary step. Where does the talk leave us, if there isn't an action to follow?

I know what I can do in my small world, in my small part, in my one to one connections. But what about the larger picture?

By Richard Baker on December 5, 2008 6:08 AM

I have been wrestling with the problems of access, equity, and quality. After this week-long debate, my question now is what’s next? Where and how do we move from here?

I would also add a thank you to the authors and the contributors of this blog. I have been checking this regularly throughout the week. This has been a great discussion.

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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Sam Hope, executive director, The National Office for Arts Accreditation (NOAA);
Jack Lew, Global University Relations Manager for Art Talent at EA;
Laura Zakaras, RAND;
James Cuno, Director, Art Institute of Chicago;
Richard Kessler, Executive Director, Center for Arts Education;
Eric Booth, Actor;
Midori, Violinist;
Bau Graves, Executive director, Old Town School of Folk Music;
Kiff Gallagher, Founder & CEO of the Music National Service Initiative and MusicianCorps
Bennett Reimer, Founder of the Center for the Study of Education and the Musical Experience, author of A Philosophy of Music Education;
Edward Pauly, the director of research and evaluation at The Wallace Foundation;
Moy Eng, Program Director of the Performing Arts Program at The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation;
John Rockwell, critic;
Susan Sclafani, Managing Director, Chartwell Education Group;
Jane Remer, Author, Educator, Researcher
Michael Hinojosa, General Superintendent, Dallas Independent School District
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