Learn More About Education
What is the Problem?
Failing Schools
One Size Fits all High Stakes Testing
Parents Left Behind
Unfunded Mandates for Local Schools
What are the Solutions?
Engaged Learning
Engaged Parents
Strategies for Promoting Engaged Learning
Class Size
Small Schools
Community-Based Institutions
After School Programs
Early Learning
Integrating the Arts
Service Learning Programs
Statistics
“Where We Are Now” report from Public Agenda
After School Findings from Afterschool Alliance
Arts Education Findings from the AAAE
Arts Education Partnership
Department of Education Study (1997)
What is the Problem?
Public education is a proud American tradition and one of the cornerstones of our democracy. We all have a stake in a thriving public education system because it enriches our children, their families, the neighborhoods they live in, the schools they attend, the community they will eventually work in, and our nation's ability to function as a democratic society.
Public education teaches our youngest citizens how to live, learn, and work together to build strong communities. Most importantly, public education represents our nation's promise to future generations that we will enable them to reach their true promise as people and citizens.
We stand at an important crossroads in our nation's history on public education. We live in a time of constant global change, both social and economic. The need for our public school system to produce thoughtful, competent leadership, one of the goals of Jefferson's public school system, and a nation of learners has never been so great.
It is imperative that we strengthen and improve our public school system so that we can best cultivate the talents and virtues of all of our people. To do this, we need to recommit ourselves to learning as a national value. Every child in the United States should have an opportunity to learn in a way that engages, challenges, and inspires them to reach their full potential.
Unfortunately, current education policies are not meeting the needs of all of our young people, our society or our democracy. Last year, Congress passed and the President signed into law the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) with goals to improve accountability for education reform, improve teacher quality and create strong standards of learning for our children. These goals are central to any earnest effort to improve our public school system. However, in its first year of implementation, there are disturbing trends that indicate that the law's mechanisms for meeting these goals are being used to justify tearing down the very public school system it was meant to repair.
There are four key ways in which NCLB undermines the goal of improving the public school system and is out of sync with learning as a national value:
- The reward and punishments of the law that labels certain schools failing
- The over reliance on high-stakes standardized tests as a measure of the success of our students and their schools
- The minimal role of parents in policies to improve schools
- The chronic under funding of the law, setting schools up for failure
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Failing Schools
In an effort to improve standards and increase accountability, the law mandates annual testing of all children in grades three through eight to ensure that all students are making progress every year. These tests determine whether a school is labeled a failing school, thus allowing a parent to send his or her child to another school. While the law says these failing schools can get remedial help to become a better school, the federal government has not allocated sufficient funding and other resources to make this option realistic. Thus, the federal government declares a school is failing, but leaves the local school districts without the proper funding to improve it.
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One Size Fits All High Stakes Testing
While the goal of improving education for all children by raising standards and increasing accountability is one that everyone can embrace, the NCLB Act's dependence on high stakes testing to achieve that goal is ineffective and misguided because a single high stakes test cannot adequately measure what every student has learned. Instead, we have a new system that over-emphasizes high stakes testing rather than engaged learning and a curriculum that ensures success for every child.
A single high stakes test leads to a one size fits all classroom that cannot meet the individual learning styles of its students. Students are subjected to an increasingly narrowed educational environment that has stripped away the creative/engaged learning critical to the development of an adaptive and entrepreneurial citizenry. As a result, public schools are being gutted, and meaningful learning programs are being dismantled.
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Parents Left Behind
Research validates that effective parent involvement is critical to strong public education. However, the current trend towards federalizing standards and curriculum threatens to impede the power of parents to help their children succeed in school. Aside from moving their children to a different school, NCLB does not provide meaningful ways for parents to be involved in improving their local schools. If school reform efforts are going to succeed, parents must be involved not only in the day-to-day efforts of their children's education, they must also have a role in creating and refining policies that affect their children's education.
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Unfunded Mandates For Local Schools
In NCLB, the federal government asserts it will be a partner in our nation's promise to our children and their families and communities to reform education so that all of our children can learn. However, chronic under-funding makes meeting the laudable goals of improving our nation's schools difficult to achieve. This is especially evident in improving teacher quality.
The NCLB aims to improve teacher quality by requiring that all teachers of core subjects be highly qualified by the end of the 2005-06 school year. This is also a laudable goal. However, the NCLB does not provide the resources needed to ensure that all teachers are properly trained so that they can be highly qualified, nor does it provide resources for recruiting or paying teachers competitive salaries.
The NCLB also limits teachers' capacity to do their best work. Everyone knows that inspiring teachers are the key to better schools and education for children, but teachers also suffer under the current education system. A generation of teachers has endured education reform that has curbed their own creativity and entrepreneurial spirit. Too much emphasis on testing forces teachers to “teach to the test” when their real job should be to inspire our students to love learning. Rather than improving teaching, the current reform undermines the profession by taking away their ability to engage students using a variety of techniques and strategies depending on the needs of the students in the class.
In addition, this limited vision of education reform undermines learning in our schools by ignoring the important learning that goes on outside the classroom. Museums, libraries, faith-based organizations, early learning programs, after school programs, arts and service learning programs all value the experiences that light the fires of children's learning. Our nation cannot afford to exclude these critical community partners from the hard work of creating an educational system that produces lifelong learners who are engaged in learning and excited about creating the future.
Our nation has a proven track record of solving great problems. We have built bridges, invented new technologies, and cured diseases. We did this by building on our strengths and using our assets wisely. We need a new discussion of education reform that taps into our great strengths as a nation. The demands of 21st century America require nothing less.
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What are the Solutions?
The national discussion that occurs during a presidential election year creates an opportunity to reexamine the purpose of public education. We want to hear policymakers and candidates articulate a broader vision of the purpose of public education–one that cultivates lifelong learners and citizens as well as workers. We want to infuse the education discussion not only with a new vision but with new language and new ideas. We want policy proposals that embody the national value of learning and reaffirm education as a pathway to opportunity for all children in America.
We call for a national mobilization around a new vision of education, one that puts engaged learning first and is committed to fulfilling the potential of every child. Our goal is to create a nation of lifelong learners. We urge students, parents, teachers, administrators, community members, school board members, and everyone else with a stake in America's future to participate. Tell your leaders that we need Results in Education!
One of the most powerful ways to improve education in this country is to strengthen the ability of parents, communities and informal learning institutions to be equal partners with teachers, educators and administrators. We believe that if parents have a clear role in improving schools, community-based informal learning institutions have stronger links to schools and teachers have the respect, flexibility and resources they need to engage children in learning, we can prepare every child to achieve their true promise as an individual in our democracy. A partnership at the local level that acknowledges these vital ingredients to student success is the path to reaching the high standards of learning that we all want for our nation's children.
Strengthening our schools requires a long-term commitment. But we must begin today to be true to our promise to our children and our country that public education will remain a powerful steppingstone to opportunity in America. We urge parents, students and teachers, grandparents and community leaders, religious leaders and business leaders to start today and take the steps necessary, individually and collectively, to make our children's education better and our communities stronger.
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Engaged Learning
A critical step toward strengthening learning opportunities for all children is to begin community conversations about the value of engaged learning. Parents know, and researchers confirm, that different children have different learning styles. Some children learn by reading, others by listening, others by doing and still others by drawing. By having an educational system that recognizes only one or two learning styles, we are denying many children the ability to reach their true promise, and denying our society of the benefits of their untapped talents. If we value the connections that occur when a child is truly engaged in learning, then why do we promote a system that allows that spark to die? In order to ensure that all children thrive, schools need to be places of active and engaged learning with a curriculum designed to maximize success for every child.
One key element in any school that values learning is having teachers who can connect with their students, teaching basic skills and important knowledge in a way that instills a love of learning. It is this dynamic engagement between teachers and students that will create a nation of lifelong learners ready to take on the many challenges of the 21st century. But in order to build engaged learning communities, we must do a better job of valuing the teachers as professionals, allocating adequate resources to recruit, train and compensate quality teachers.
Schools that truly value engaged learning use tests as one of many tools to gauge whether children are learning, whether the curriculum is working, and whether teachers are able to convey information to their students. But for many children, tests do not present a clear, comprehensive assessment of what a child has learned. Tests can be biased against particular groups of children as well as children with particular learning styles. Judging children based solely on a test is not fair, and too frequently an over-emphasis on testing undermines engaged learning. Tests should be used primarily as a diagnostic tool to help identify and remedy weaknesses in the curriculum, teaching methods, or an individual student's learning style. When a test exposes a student's weakness, that student should receive extra help, such as tutoring. Too much emphasis on a single test crowds out other important learning opportunities such as art, music, physical education, and in some instances any subject not covered by the test. In the absence of federal, state or local mandates to the contrary, schools rely upon a range of assessment mechanisms to measure progress through the years. In a thriving learning community, multiple assessment tools including tests, written work, performances, oral presentations, and peer and teacher-reviewed portfolios can be used to gauge the progress of individual students, the effectiveness of teachers, and the overall success of a school as a place of engaged learning. In addition, some schools may consider community service, participation in athletics, and school leadership to be important measures of progress. Most parents believe that they know their child is succeeding at school when they are happy—perhaps the most accurate measure of all. Local communities should have the flexibility to determine how their schools evaluate their students.
We believe that many of our communities are on the right track and have created a public school system that understands the many needs of children. But for all of our children to achieve their true promise, we call for an increased role for parents as part of the team that creates a successful, thriving school along with greater investment in the strategies that work.
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Engaged Parents
Parents are primary stakeholders in their children's education. For too long, however, parents have been largely excluded from conversations about how their schools operate. They have been viewed as consumers, rather than owners, of the public education system. The best way to ensure high standards and accountability in every school is to give parents a meaningful role in the leadership of their school and a voice in shaping education policy. Therefore, we call for a new era of parental involvement in which parents are actively engaged in the governance of their local school and have a powerful voice in education policy.
Communities across the nation are exploring ways to create opportunities for parents to be involved in their local schools' policies and procedures. In many communities, groups of parents are working together to build a productive relationship with their local school board. One example of true parent involvement can be found in Chicago's Local School Councils, which are parent-majority elected bodies that have to approve the school's budget and strategic plan, and have the authority to approve or reject the principal's employment contract. www.pureparents.org
While other cities lack the local school council mechanism, parents are becoming active in a myriad of ways. For example, a group of parent advocates in Cincinnati developed a guide to teach parents how to be involved in the selection of a new principal when there is a vacancy in their school (www.parents4publicschools.com). Parents in Lancaster, South Carolina worked with their superintendent to create a parents' guide to the schools that looked at information and issues that were important to parents. Copies of the guide were inserted in the local newspaper. www.parents4publicschools.com
Parents are also becoming increasingly engaged in advocacy on behalf of their children's learning opportunities. Parents become involved in their children's education for any number of reasons—class sizes are too large, too much testing, unfair allocation of resources, cuts in arts programs—but once they are engaged, they become advocates for a better education system. Many parents are getting involved through Parents for Public Schools (PPS) (www.parents4publicschools.com). PPS is a national organization with locally based chapters in more than 20 communities – and it is growing. By mobilizing parents who reflect the full diversity of towns and cities, PPS works to build both strong public schools and healthier, more vital communities.
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Many parents get involved in education reform efforts because they believe the current system is inequitable. For example, the Syracuse, NY PPS chapter developed a Voter Education Packet to simplify and clarify school board election issues and bring equity to the forefront. Three of four incumbents were defeated, and two parent members of PPSS were elected and now hold office of president and vice president of the board. www.parents4publicschools.com
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Many parents are concerned that high stakes testing is unfair, and puts too much pressure on their children.
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Many parents are concerned about the way legislators allocate funds for school districts in their state. PPS of Houston has sponsored several bus trips to the state capitol in Austin. The legislators know that these parents want adequate and equitable funding for public education and expect sound educational policy that benefits all the children of Texas. And they know that PPS of Houston's parents are watching!
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Many parents want to work with local teachers and administrators to improve the education their children receive. In Buffalo, the PPS chapter is involved in collaborative work with the school district, local colleges, universities and other education groups in developing small schools and best practice initiatives.
We applaud this growing trend of parent involvement. But we need more. We urge parents across the nation to raise their voices on behalf of their children. Parents know best when their children are happy and learning. Join with other parents to make a difference in your children's school. Back to top
Strategies for Promoting Engaged Learning
Schools across the country are experimenting with different ways to promote engaged learning in order to cultivate successful students who not only meet academic standards but also are fully developed citizens in their communities. Communities are limiting class size, creating small schools, partnering with innovative after school programs that promote creativity and support learning, and working with community partners to expand learning opportunities for children. In many communities, schools districts are working with formal and informal learning providers to ensure that children thrive when they enter school. Different communities have differing needs, and thus there is no one-size fits-all formula for creating vibrant schools where children are engaged in learning. However, research and practical experience demonstrate several strategies that work.
Back to top Class Size
Educational researchers believe that reducing class size, particularly in the early years, significantly increases the amount of learning that takes place in the classroom. Small class size has been shown to increase student achievement, particularly in urban areas. Reducing class size works because it allows teachers to spend more time with each student, focusing on individual learning styles, accommodating individual instructional needs, and providing timely assessment of written and oral work. Students have more time for meaningful oral presentations and peer-to-peer critiques in small classes. Finally, parents are more likely to be involved in smaller classes because it is easier to develop a relationship with the teacher. See Class Size Matters (www.classsizematters.org), National Conference of Teachers of English (www.ncte.org/about).
Small class size appeals to the public because it makes sense–a teacher can do a better job teaching fewer students. Reducing class size has emerged as a policy change that voters can identify and support as a concrete way to improve education. Voters in Florida endorsed this common sense approach by passing a referendum requiring that by 2010, the state will have to provide public schools that have no more than 18 students per class for grades K-3, no more than 22 for grades 4-8, and no more than 25 in high school. Florida is poised to lead the nation in demonstrating, at a statewide level, that reducing class size results in greater student achievement, increased accountability, and, most importantly, abundant opportunities for engaged learning. www.supportbeniciaschools.com
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Small Schools
Creating small schools is another strategy that communities across the country are exploring. Small schools have been embraced in many urban communities as a way to address concerns about equity. They are also being used in rural and suburban communities. In terms of numbers, small schools generally have fewer than 400 students. Small schools provide a safer, more personalized environment where teachers know their students, and the parents of their students. Most small schools are committed to building a democratic environment, where parents, teachers and administrators work together. This strong sense of community leads to greater parent involvement and greater accountability.
Studies indicate that teachers in small schools are given more flexibility in their teaching and have more time for each student, allowing them to better address individual needs. In turn, the increased professionalization of teachers results in students who are more active learners, who outperform their peers on standardized tests, have a lower dropout rate, and are more likely to go on to college. See Center for Collaborative Educatio (www.cce.org), Small Schools Workshop, (www.smallschoolsworkshop.org), Annie E. Casey Foundation report on small schools, (www.aecf.org/publications/success/smschool.htm).
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Community-Based Institutions
Museums, libraries, parks, zoos, religious organizations, early learning, after school, sports, arts, and service learning programs represent natural and crucial partners in the effort to promote learning as a social value. Innovative partnerships between schools and community organizations create opportunities for children to learn in new ways and explore new environments. They also provide the type of hands-on learning experiences that allow children who learn best through doing to thrive.
Whether it is school visits at a children's museum, where children can learn and experience a rain forest, or an after school program, where children can express what they have learned about the world around them, or a service learning program, where children can understand first-hand the problems in their community and their role in solving these problems, community-based opportunities offer a rich variety of learning experiences that can enhance their success in school and life.
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After School Programs
A growing trend is the increasing role of after school programs. Research suggests that high quality after school programs provide academic support and social enrichment activities for children that complement and enhance the learning that takes place in classrooms during regular school hours. In addition to the academic benefits, after school programs provide a safe place where children feel free to grow socially and emotionally, where they develop new skills and talents that they do not have time to explore in school, and where they can learn in their own individual style and have fun in the process. In many cities, mayors are taking a lead in promoting quality after school programming because they understand they are one way to build stronger, safer communities. See Afterschool Alliance (www.afterschoolalliance.org), City of Boston 2:00 to 6:00 Initiative (www.cityofboston.gov/2to6)
The Citizens Schools after school model focuses on providing a safe, challenging and engaging program for urban children. The program includes apprenticeships and explorations that give children hands-on learning opportunities. Citizen Schools focuses on skill development—particularly in the areas of writing, data analysis, and oral communication—and links closely to school activities and learning standards. Citizen Schools turns children into community heroes: children apprentice with lawyers, web designers, architects—culminating their learning apprenticeships by arguing trials before federal judges, designing web sites for their school, organizing public events, publishing newspapers, and much more. Building on its early success with children in Boston, Citizens Schools has expanded across Massachusetts and is moving into states around the country. www.citizenschools.org.
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Early Learning
Over the past 20 years, an explosion of neuroscience research has served as a catalyst for a new understanding that children begin learning at birth. Learning for young children can take place in many settings including the home, informal settings such as family, friend and neighbor care, and in high quality early learning programs. We now know that regardless of the setting, when young children are surrounded by caring adults who love them, talk to them, play with them, and read to them, they have the chance to develop the foundation needed to be lifelong learners. www.earlycare.org
In order to ensure that every child has a good start in life, there is a growing understanding that public investment in high quality early learning systems is an excellent investment in the future. Some of the components of this approach include parent education, training for informal care providers and early learning professionals, and support for programs that nurture the social, emotional and cognitive development of young children. Improving the quantity, quality and accessibility of such programs is a critical step in ensuring that all children succeed in school and in life. www.buildinitiative.org
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Integrating the Arts
Research shows that the public believes that the arts play an important role in a child's development. Art should be a part of a well-rounded education because it helps children think creatively, gain a sense of accomplishment and improve overall learning. Researchers have found that integrating arts in a curriculum with science and math is essential as we teach what Robert Root-Bernstein calls the “tools of thought” skills that allow people to learn whatever they need to learn to solve problems throughout their lives. The type of tools of thought that come from studying the arts—pattern recognition, mental visualization, hand-eye coordination, and physical modeling, just to name a few—can help create new ways of thinking about today's problems and challenges in all fields of thought.
Some communities are working to integrate the arts more fully into their school curricula. Having an integrated arts curriculum is particularly important for reaching students who are more creative, and who learn through creative expression. In the absence of such programs, these students may be left behind. It will take all of us to build an education system in which engaged learning is the norm. Schools, strengthened by these community partnerships, can create a web of learning opportunities that will engage, inspire and challenge all children so that as they grow, they acquire the knowledge and problem solving skills needed to sustain, enrich and strengthen our democracy.
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Service Learning Programs
Many communities have embraced service learning as a tool to increase learning opportunities in their schools. Service learning is a teaching method that combines meaningful service to the community with curriculum-based learning. It is designed to help students improve academic skills by applying what they learn in the classroom to the real world. By teaching young people that they can and should play a positive role in their community, service learning encourages lifelong civic participation. Service learning gives students a sense of competency. They see themselves as active contributors rather than passive recipients of adult support. Service learning also helps address real community needs, builds stronger connections between schools and communities, and improves the overall school climate.
Service learning can take many forms—volunteering with the elderly, developing a vocabulary book for non-English speakers, building low-income housing. It may best be understood by example:
As part of their science curriculum, middle grades students take water samples of their local waterway. They analyze the amount and nature of pollutants in the water and look for the source of that pollution. They write letters to their local government to inform the city officials of the problem and encourage them to take action.
Other examples can be found at www.learningindeed.org
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Statistics
Statistics From “Where We Are Now” report from Public Agenda
Click on the link below to download the complete report in PDF format: www.publicagenda.com/PDFStore/PDFs/where_we_are_now.pdf
It's wrong to use results from just one test as basis for promotion. (p13)
- 75% of parents agree
- 89% of teachers agree
- 81% of employers agree
- 83% of professors agree
- 62% of students agree
Schools should use standardized test scores and teacher evaluations as basis for
promotion. (p13)
- 83% of parents agree
- 80% of teachers agree
- 86% of employers agree
- 82% of professors agree
- 71% of students agree
Schools place far too much emphasis on standardized test scores. (p13)
- 60% of parents agree
- 84% of teachers agree
- 52% of employers agree
- 57% of professors agree
- 5% of students agree
Teachers will end up teaching to the test. (p13)
- 66% of parents agree
- 79% of teachers agree
- 64% of employers agree
- 79% of professors agree
Parents say the best way to measure academic achievement is: (p13)
- 61%: classwork and homework
- 22%: test scores
- 16%: both
- 1%: don't know
Rank-and-file teachers are often left out of the loop in their district's decision making process. (p17)
Parents don't know a lot about the curriculum being taught in their child's school. (p18)
- 58% know a lot about curriculum for their child's grade
- 45% know a lot about availability of rigorous courses in their child's high school
- 25% are very comfortable helping plan curriculum
- 15% have helped plan curriculum in the past
Teachers wish there was more parental involvement. (p24)
- 98% say it's always the same group of parents who are helping out at school
- 78% say too many parents don't know what's going on with their child's education
- 65% say more parental involvement would help my students be more successful in school
- 34% say parental involvement in my school is excellent or good
- 83% say the best way for parents to be involved with their child's education is to check homework and encourage learning
Principals and Superintendents are hampered by politics and bureaucracy. (p28) Talented teachers are most likely to leave the field because of: Low pay and prestige
- 5% Superintendents
- 14% Principals
Politics and bureaucracy
- 81% Superintendents
- 47% Principals
Unreasonable demands brought about by higher standards and accountability
- 10% Superintendents
- 34% Principals
Americans don't like the idea of closing schools. (p31) If a school doesn't show progress toward meeting standards, Americans would favor:
- 21%: Closing the school
- 52% Supporting tax increases to improve funding in the school
- 77% Obtaining more money from the local district
From Public Agenda website
Some children perform poorly on tests even though they know the material.
www.publicagenda.com/issues/major_proposals_detail.cfm
- 49% Strongly Agree
- 32% Somewhat Agree
Statewide tests cannot measure many important skills children should learn.
- 36% Strongly Agree
- 35% Somewhat Agree
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After School Findings from Afterschool Alliance
(www.afterschoolalliance.org) Study conducted over four years of 30,000 students involved in 96 different after school programs in New York City.
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Students who were active participants for three years gained an average of six points more than non-participants on New York City's standardized math examinations
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Students who participated for two years gained an average of four points more
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Students who were highly active gained six points more in only two years
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While school attendance of non-participants declined during the period between fifth and eighth grades, those who were active participants in after school programs showed an increase in attendance after one year in the program
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In 2000-2001, 93 percent of principals said the after school program enhanced the school's overall effectiveness
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Increased Parental Involvement: Fifty-four percent of program coordinators reported that more than half of the parents of students enrolled in the after school program attended special events hosted by the program
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Eighty five percent of high school participants said the program provided a stronger sense of community
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Eighty five percent of elementary-grade participants noted that the TASC-supported program provided them with academic benefits
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African-American students were especially likely to improve their academic performance as a result of their participation in TASC-sponsored programs, posting math gains after just one year on average. Latino students tended to post math gains after two years of participation, as did students from low-income families.
Poll conducted in Aug 2002
Do you agree or disagree there should be some type of organized activity or place for children and teens to go after school every day that provides opportunities for them to learn?
Strongly agree ......................................................................55
Not so strongly agree ...........................................................35
Not so strongly disagree .........................................................7
Strongly disagree ....................................................................1
(don't know) ............................................................................2 Again, thinking about after school programs, would you say that after school programs are an absolute necessity for your community?
Yes, strongly ....................................................................... 38
Yes, not so strongly .............................................................35
No, not so strongly ..............................................................16
No, strongly ...........................................................................7
Don't know ............................................................................5
How important is it to you personally to ensure access to after school programs for all children? Is it very important, somewhat important, not too important, or not important all?
Very important ....................................................................34
Somewhat important ...........................................................36
Not too important ................................................................18
Not important at all ...............................................................7
Don't know ............................................................................4 What parents said about their child's experience in an after school program:
My child does better in reading, writing and math since attending an after school program.
My child has learned how to get along with other children and behaves better in school since attending an after school program.
My child is more likely to avoid drugs and alcohol since attending an after school program.
My child is safer and less likely to be involved in juvenile crime than children who aren't in after school programs.
Our family life is less stressful than other families' because we know our child has a structured, safe place to go after school.
My child is more physically fit and participates in more athletics than children who aren't in an after school program.
Do you agree with President's Bush proposal to NOT increase funding for after school programs?
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Art Education Findings From the AAAE
Association for the Advancement of Arts Education (www.aaae.org)
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There is evidence that working with the arts, especially in grades kindergarten through seven, develops students' minds and bodies in ways that enable them to learn better. The arts, particularly music, dance, and visual art, develop neural connections and body/brain connections which further learning in many areas, including math, reading, writing, and general language development. Having students work with creative drama and theatre in these earlier grades gives them a great advantage in their capacity for developing language skills, reading, writing, and verbal, and interpersonal skills. And all of the arts help students develop emotionally and socially, so that they are more prepared to deal with school, life, and other people.
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All of the arts are effective in keeping kids in school, in reaching at-risk students and students with distinctive learning styles, and in helping to develop a more disciplined educational environment in which students' energies are directed at learning and creating. The arts also help students develop key “habits of mind” that include creativity, critical thinking, the ability to pose and solve problems, self discipline, and self confidence.
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There is evidence that when the arts are connected in meaningful ways with other subject areas, students comprehend and retain more about the subjects involved. Arts programs have been quite effective in teaching math, science, reading, writing, general language development, history, and social studies.
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Interpersonal skills; the ability to work in teams; an understanding, tolerance, and even appreciation for diversity in people and ideas; and the ability to lead and communicate effectively with groups are all strengthened through participation in the arts.
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Arts Education Partnership
(www.aep-arts.org/Champions.html)
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Students with high levels of arts participation outperform “arts-poor” students by virtually every measure, including success in other academic subjects and in developing positive attitudes about community. This correlation is particularly strong between music and math.
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Fourteen high-poverty schools in Chicago adopted an art-integrated curriculum. Comparing these14 schools with many others in Chicago, all have been making gains in student performance, but those 14 have significantly outpaced their arts-poor neighboring schools in a wide variety of student achievement.
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When studying students in three types of after school programs (sports/academic, community involvement and the arts) it was found all participants were improving their academic performance and personal lives compared to their classmates who did not participate in after school activities. It was found that students who participated in arts after school programs improved the most, despite the fact that more of them were at-risk students.
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Researchers at the National Center for the Gifted and Talented found that New York City students involved in the arts were motivated to learn across the board, not just for test results, grades, or other performance outcomes, but for the learning experience itself.
Reading and language development—Certain forms of arts instruction enhance and complement basic reading instruction aimed at helping children “break the phonetic code” that unlocks written language by associating letters, words, and phrases with sounds, sentences, and meanings. Reading comprehension and speaking and writing skills are also improved. Mathematics—Certain music instruction develops spatial reasoning and spatial-temporal reasoning skills, which are fundamental to understanding and using mathematical ideas and concepts. Fundamental thinking skills and capacities—Learning in individual art forms, as well as in multiple arts experiences, engages and strengthens such fundamental cognitive capacities as spatial reasoning, conditional reasoning, problem-solving, and creative thinking. Motivations to learn—Learning in the arts nurtures motivation, including active engagement, disciplined and sustained attention, persistence, and risk-taking, and also increases attendance and educational aspirations. Effective social behavior—Studies of student learning in certain arts activities show student growth in self-confidence, self-control, self-identity, conflict resolution, collaboration, empathy, and social tolerance. School environment—Studies show that the arts help to create the kind of learning environment that is conducive to teacher and student success by fostering teacher innovation, a positive professional culture, community engagement, increased student attendance and retention, effective instructional practice, and school identity. www.aep-arts.org/final press release.doc
Support from the community—Parents, families, local artists and organizations)are hugely influential factors in the quality of arts education at a particular school. www.aep-arts.org/PDF Files/GAA Report.pdf
Back to top Department of Education Study (1997)
www.ed.gov/pubs/FamInvolve/execsumm.html
When families are involved in their children's education, children earn higher grades and receive higher scores on tests, attend school more regularly, complete more homework, demonstrate more positive attitudes and behaviors, graduate from high school at higher rates, and are more likely to enroll in higher education than students with less involved families.
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