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Art
is Core of Education
by
Scott Noppe-Brandon
Several
weeks ago I heard Chancellor Klein speak at a breakfast held
at New York Law School. His speech was excellent, as were the
questions that followed. The Chancellor articulately presented
and discussed his vision, and, notably, assured the audience
that his views were also those of the mayor. He highlighted
such topics as Management-Based reform, which is to be at the
root of a performance-based culture rather than an excuse-based
culture. In underscoring the particular attributes of these
reform efforts, the Chancellor declared that previously the
school system seemed to deter innovation rather than embrace
it; as for the current system, he said, there is a fear of
differentiation at its core, which undermines innovation and
change.
Unfortunately,
there is a worthy item that Chancellor Klein did not have time
to discuss: the recently distributed Guide for Parents and
Families, a document which begins to detail the complexities
of what is new and/or different in our schools this academic
year. The Guide certainly merits comment. Let me start with:
Yea! The arts are mentioned on the first page, side by side
with the universally acknowledged subjects of prime importance:
reading, writing, and math. In addition, they are presented
as “a core element for teaching and learning.” Double Yea!!!
The arts are a vital part of the teaching and learning in our
NYC schools. Am I crazy or is that not the most important statement
made about the arts in many years? It means that not only should
the arts be part of the school day, part of the curriculum:
they are a key component of a well-rounded, defined, articulated
viewpoint of teaching and learning, they are at the heart of
the educational process.
With
that exclamation, allow me to express my hope. Chancellor,
please make it happen! Make the arts central to the teaching
and learning of every teacher and every student. All teachers
must be imaginative, creative, focused in their teaching. All
students must be imaginative, creative, focused in their learning.
Here
is what I believe is happening this year in the NYC schools,
and how I believe the scenario needs to play out. As expected,
the schools must improve how they teach all of the core subjects,
especially the vital capacities of reading and math. Time will
be spent on these key areas to insure that teachers have a
strong foundation in implementing the required/suggested curricula
and that students have time to learn. Schools have more funds
available for the arts, but maybe less time to make them part
of the core.
We
in the arts community must support the effort to make teaching
and learning in reading, writing, and math a priority this
year. All of us involved in the arts and education must press
forward together; on our quest to better understand how the
arts community can work together with the DOE to make the arts
a core element of teaching and learning. We must join the Chancellor
in his dream of eliminating the excuse-based culture by not
being part of it ourselves. We must continue to embrace the
challenge of making our diverse and powerful work in the arts
increasingly relevant to the overall goals of teaching and
learning.
In
doing so, one of the things we hope to achieve is to make everyone
who works in our schools better understand the ethical responsibility
of treating students as human beings who have social, intellectual,
emotional, and spiritual capacities that need to be developed
and expressed. We know that students search for order, form,
and pattern in their lives. They try to make sense out of experience
and find appropriate forms for expression of a range of deep
emotions. Those who work with, and care for, youth need to
help them find faith and hope in a world that is complex, sometimes
harsh, always infinitely interesting.
Through
art, human beings struggle to give expression to their own
experiences in interpreting their multi-faceted world. And
through aesthetic engagement with art, we can equip children
and youth to imaginatively engage with life as they encounter
its challenges and its possibilities. As encapsulated by Dr.
Maxine Greene, “If we are seriously interested in education
for freedom, it is important to find a way of developing a
praxis of educational consequences that opens the spaces necessary
for the remaking of a democratic community. For this to happen,
there must of course be a new commitment to intelligence, a
new fidelity in communication, a new regard for imagination.
It would mean fresh and sometimes startling winds blowing through
the classrooms of the nation.”
In
closing: as the work of arts educators and the arts community
becomes fully integrated into the core teaching and learning
values of the NYC schools, we continue to remember the challenge
put forth by the Chancellor: we must be part of innovation,
not fear differentiation, and make no excuses about what we
must accomplish. We have to believe that the Chancellor and
the Mayor want this as much as we in the arts do. We must be
supportive and never accept less than what is right and necessary
for the students of NYC: great schools based on great teaching
and learning, with the arts as a core element of that practice.#
Scott
Noppe-Brandon is the Executive Director of the Lincoln Center
Institute.
Education
Update, Inc., P.O. Box 1588, New York, NY 10159.
Tel: (212) 477-5600. Fax: (212) 477-5893. Email: ednews1@aol.com.
All material is copyrighted and may not be printed without express consent of
the publisher. © 2003.
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