r / •ii* y ' JUnni Painting from the Lascaux Cares, courtesy of the French Government Tourist Offu ?e, New York Toward Civilization Overview from A Report on Arts Education National Endowment for the Arts May 1988 Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2015 https://archive.org/details/towardcivilizatiOOnati Foreword We need to help our children move toward civilization. As we stand on the threshold of the 21 si century, we are concerned, and rightlv so, with the quality of the education of young Americans and whether it is preparing them for the challenges of the future. Many of the challenges will, obviously, be scientific and technological — and our schools must give our children the tools to deal w it h them. I ,ess obviously, many of the challenges will be cultural. They w ill pose questions concerning what it is to be an American and what our civilization stands for. Education in the arts can help with this. Arts education can help elementary and secondary school students to reach out “beyond prime time” and understand the unchanging elements in the human condition. It can leach them to see and hear as well as read and write. It can help them understand what civilization is so that as adults they can contribute to it. In a culturally diverse society, it can generate understanding of both the core and multiplicity of America’s culture. In an age of television, it can teach our children how the arts can be, and have been, used. In a world made smaller by modern communication and travel, it can teach them how tin* cultures and civilizations of other countries affect attitudes, beliefs and behavior. It can help our children develop the skills for creativity and problem-solving and acquire the tools of communication. It can help them develop the capacity for making wise choices among the products ol the arts which so affect our environment and daily lives. The National Endowment lor the Arts is privileged to present its report on arts education to the President and Congress. We attempt in this report to identify the arts that should be taught in school, to present the reasons for studying them, to show why the present state of arts education is unsatisfactory, and to suggest avenues for its improvement. We look at conditions in American classrooms and at teachers. We explore the state of arts curricula, testing and evaluation, and research. We examine leadership in arts education and the role of the National Endowment for the Arts. We have found a gap between commitment and resources for arts education and the actual practice of arts education in classrooms. Resources are being provided, but they are not being used to give opportunities for all, or even most, students to become culturallv literate. The arts are in general not being taught sequentially. Students ol the arts are not being evaluated. Many arts teachers are not prepared to teach history and critical analysis of the arts. This condition of arts education is no worse now than it has been. The vast majority ol today’s adults sav they had no real education in the v arts when they were in school. Then as now, resources for arts education were used primarily to produce performances and exhibitions by talented and interested students for the enjoyment of parents and the community. They are not being used to help young people move toward civilization. This is a tragedy, for the individual and the nation. To make a start on a remedy, we propose that: State education agencies and school districts should develop consensus on what all students should know in the arts before graduating from high school. They should provide required and optional courses, curricula and materials to achieve this. The design and media arts should be included as should history, critical analysis, creation and performance. We suggest that 15 percent of the school week or year be allotted to the arts in elementary, middle and junior high and that the equivalent of two full years be allotted in high school. State education agencies, with federal assistance, should develop procedures comparatively to evaluate district and school arts programs in relation to state arts education goals. Local school districts, with federal and state assistance, should do the same based on their curricula. State certifying agencies should strengthen and broaden teacher certification requirements in the arts for all teachers whose respon- sibilities include the arts. Testing of arts teacher qualifications should be improved and mandated. Recruitment and professional development efforts should be strengthened, the teaching environment improved, and special procedures designed to permit qualified artists and arts professionals to teach the arts w here there are shortages of specialists. More sustained support for arts education research is needed. Research should be focused on improving classroom instruction. The U.S. Department of Education and the National Endowment for the Arts should continue and strengthen research to help educators improve arts education in schools. The two federal agencies should work together to include the arts in an expanded National Assessment of Educational Progress to provide national assessments and state-level comparisons. Those who believe ihe arts should he a basic part of education should work together to develop consensus on the purpose and content of arts education. They must make the cast* for arts education being a fundamental educational responsibility. Ensuring comprehensive and sequential arts education calls for greater political effort than would be necessary lor subjects currently assumed to be basic. The National Endowment for the Arts should continue and strengthen its arts education efforts over at least the next 10-year period. Endowment efforts to date have set the agency on this course. It will take time, however, to make the case for arts education, facilitate state and local collaborations, and help develop and distribute curricular, instructional, and assessment models. The Endowment should con- tinue its efforts to develop a television series on the arts for young people. The report. Toward Civilization , from which this Overview is taken, was built on thousands of hours of research and consultation and benefits from the advice of many of those dedicated to the cause of arts education. We are indebted to Congress for requesting the report and to those who helped prepare it. Whatever deficiencies there may be in the report are mine. Frank Hodsoll Chairman National Endowment for the Arts viii Contents FOREWORD OVERVIEW APPENDICES BIBLIOGRAPHY v 1 1 What Is Basic Arts Education? 1 Why Is Basic Arts Education Important? 6 What Is the Problem? 7 The State of Arts Education Today 21 Conclusion 23 Recommendations 34 34 What Our Presidents Have Said about the Arts 37 The Congressional Mandate 38 Source Materials 39 Acknowledgements 41 National Council on the Arts 42 Members of the Advisory Committee 45 Excerpts from The National Foundation on the Arts and Humanities Act of 1965 46 House Report 99-274 48 IX X Overview WHAT IS BASIC ARTS EDUCATION? 'Art. no less than philosophy or sci- ence, issues a challenge to the in- tellect. The great works of music, sculpture, painting, engraving, and all other forms of artistic expression engage the mind, teaching lessons about order, proportion, and genius." - WILLIAM J. BENNETT U.S. Secretary of Education WHY IS BASIC ARTS EDUCATION IMPORTANT? In 1985, the Congress called fora “study ol the state of arts education and humanities education. The National Endowment for the Humanities published its report, American Memory . on August 3 1 . 1987. Vt hat follows is the Overview from Toward Civilization, the report of the National Endowment for the Arts' study on arts education. Basie arts education aims to provide all students, not only the gifted and talented, with knowledge of, and skills in, the arts. Basic arts education must give students the essence of our civilization, the civilizations which have contributed to ours, and the more distant civilizations which enrich world civilization as a whole. It must also give students tools for creating, for communicating and understanding others' communications, and (or making informed and critical choices. Basic arts education includes the disciplines of literature (from the art of writing); visual art and design (from the arts of painting, sculpture, photography, video, crafts, architecture, landscape and interior design, product and graphic design); performing art (from the arts of dance, music, opera, and musical theater and theater); and media art (from the arts of film, television, and radio). While each of these art disciplines differs in character, tradition, and form, basic arts education must also include art forms that are interdisciplinary: opera and musical theater, which combine vocal and instrumental music with drama and stage design; film and television, which combine music, drama, and the visual arts, synthesized by the media arts themselves; and new work that extends the frontiers of current artistic convention. Just as artists collaborate to produce interdisciplinary arts, so school faculties will need to collaborate to teach them. Like other school subjects, basic arts education must be taught sequentially by qualified teachers; instruction must include the history, critical theory, and ideas of the arts as well as creation, production, and performance; and knowledge of, and skills in. the arts must be tested. As lor other school subjects, appropriate resources — classroom time, administrative support, and textbooks — must be provided to this end. The problem is: basic arts education does not exist in the United States today. Our last seven Presidents have all affirmed the idea that the arts are at the core of what we are and, therefore, of what we should know. President Reagan, after quoting John Adams to the effect that his grandchildren should have “a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture. ' urged us to “resolve that our schools will teach our children the same respect and 1 'Art is humanity's most essential, most universal language. It is not a frill, but a necessary part of communication. The quality of civilization can be measured through its music, dance, drama, architecture, visual art and liter- ature. IFe must give our children knowledge and understanding of civilization's most profound works.' - ERNEST L. BOYER President Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching Civilization 'This moment of mounting concern (d)out American education is the time to help our dedicated teach- ers and our schools transnut the significance and common heritage of the arts, so that our young pro- file will not be denied the oppor- tunity to become citizens this Nation deserves.'' -J. CARTER BROWN Director National Gallery of Art appreciation for the arts and humanities that the Founders had." A balanced education is essential to an enlightened citizenry and a productive work force, and a balanced education must include comprehensive and sequential study in the three great branches of learning — the arts, humanities, and sciences. It is basic understanding of the combination of these areas ol learning that provides for what E.l). Hirseh, Jr. calls “cultural literacy." There are four reasons win arts education is important: to understand civilization, to develop creativity, to learn the tools of communication, and to develop the capacity for making wise choices among the products of the arts. Lest it be feared that arts education might detract from basic skills thought to be essential to productivity, the example of Japan, whose productivity is without question, is instructive; the Japanese require extensive and sequential arts instruction from kindergarten through twelfth grade. Very important, arts education is essential for all students, not just the gifted and talented. The schools teach reading and writing (including literature) to all students, not just those who are good at these subjects. Just as knowledge of. and skills in, words are essential to functioning in society, so knowledge of, and skills in, nonverbal communication are essential. In order to cope with a 21st century permeated by technological change and the electronic media, young Americans need a sense of themselves and their civilization and ol the vocabularies of the images on television. Today's kindergartners will be the first graduating class of the 21st century. fhe first purpose of arts education is to give our young people a sense of civ ilization. American civilization includes many cultures — from Europe, Africa, the Far East and our own hemisphere. The great works of art of these parent civilizations, and of our own, provide the guideposts to cultural literacy. Knowing them, our young people will be better able to understand, and therefore build on, the achievements of the past: they will also be better able to understand themselves. Great works ol art illuminate the constancy ol the human condition. Mere exposure to the best ol the arts is not enough. As Elliot Eisner of Stanford University has said, the best of art needs to be “unwrapped, to be studied in order to be understood. The schools already teach the vocabularies and ideas of good writing by including great literature in English studies. But great works ol art also communicate in images, sounds, and movements, l he schools need to teach the vocabularies of these images, sounds, and movements, as well as of words, il young Americans are to graduate from high school with a sense of civilization. All we know of the earliest civilizations comes to us through the arts 2 ‘When members of a society wish to secure that society's rich heritage they cherish their arts and respect their artists. The es- teem with which we regard the multiple cultures offered in our country enhances our possibilities for healthy survived and contin- ued social development. - MAYA ANGELOU Artist Creativity — whether the paintings of the caves of Eascaux, the ancient bronzes and pottery figures of pre-Shang China, or the pyramids of Egypt. \\ ithout the epics of Homer, without the Parthenon, the whole heritage of Greek civilization would be lost to ns; without the bronze sculptures of Benin we would know nothing of the great African empire that antedated Spain’s by nearly 100 years; without the great temples overgrown by the jungles of Mexico and Central America, the achievements of the Maya would go unremembered. Without knowledge and understanding of such supreme achievements, we are “culturally illiterate.’ American civilization has a central core which Henry Geldzahler, the former Fine Arts Commissioner of New York City, describes as a “sleeping giant.’’ The core includes — to name a very few — such diverse artists as Shakespeare, LaoTse, Cervantes, Melv ille, and Henry James; Praxiteles. Michelangelo, Velasquez, Frank Lloyd Wright, Winslow Homer, and Jackson Pollock; Bach. Mozart, Beethoven, Aaron Copland, and Duke Ellington; George Balanchine, Martha Graham, and Katherine I )unham; Jan P eerce, Marian Anderson, and Leontyne Price; and John Huston and Katharine Hepburn. The American giant is largely European, but includes strains of Africa, Asia, and the other parts of our own hemisphere. In designing the contents of arts education, we must set out to make this “giant a part of the knowledge and experience of all Americans. The “giant ' is American civilization. A second purpose of arts education is to foster creativity. Young people should have the opportunity to emulate master artists — to take blank sheets of paper or rolls of film or video tape and fill them, to blow a trumpet and make melodies and rhythms, to design a house or a city, and to move in dance. To acquire the skills with which to do this requires hard work and discipline, but to use them to create a personal vision can be a joyful experience. Moreover, whether by inference from a collection of phenomena, or by creating an initial hypothesis from which deductions might flow, learning in the arts can not only develop the discipline and craft necessary to constructive creation, it can also help students to develop reasoning and problem-solving skills essential to a productive work force and to the learning of other subjects. Trying to create or perform the nonliterary arts without skills and knowledge is like trying to write without vocabulary and syntax. The student is reduced to being the “first artist.” No one would dream of teaching the art of writing that way, just as no one would teach mathematics or physics without the benefit of Euclid or Newton. Arts education must include the vocabularies and basic skills which produced the great works 3 Mr. wr LLI AM SHAKESPEARKS COMEDIES, HISTORIES, & T R A O EDI E S. Publiilied acconiiug to the True OnWinallCopie- William Shakespeare, Title Page of First Folio , The Folger Shakespeare Library, Washington 4 Communication of the past so that young people can build on those who came before. To create and perform works of art is also to engage actively in the process of worldmaking. As the well-known psychologist Jerome Bruner reminds us, Aristotle in tin* Poetics observed that “the poet s function is to describe, not the thing that has happened, but a kind of thing that might happen." Bruner notes that tyrants hate and fear poets “even more than they fear and hate scientists, who, though they create possible worlds, leave no place in them for possible alternative personal perspectives on those worlds." Such perspectives are very much the domain of the poet, the artist. The function of art is “to open us to dilemmas, to the hypothetical ; it is in this respect “an instrument of freedom, lightness, imagination, and yes, reason. A third purpose of arts education is to teach effective communication. As great orators and writers through history have shown, speaking and writing are art forms; the best of writing becomes “literature and is studied as such. But all writing, whether it is a political speech, advertising copy, a novel or a poem, is an attempt to communicate to readers. I he other art forms also have languages through which artists speak to audiences. The language may be primarily verbal, as in literature, or non- verbal, as in music, dance, or the visual and design arts, or it may be a combination of both, as in drama, opera and musical theater, and the media arts. Young people must be given an education enabling them to understand these languages and to analyze their meanings. Their education should include learning elementary artistic skills which can be used in later life — whether visually to express some non- verbal concept ina corporate board room, or to play a phrase on a piano to illustrate tonal differences, or to sing a song, or to use acting techniques to make a point or tell a joke effectively, or to record in words or line an especially memorable personal experience. Understanding of nonverbal communication is especially important in a time when television has become a principal medium of communica- tion. Television reaches everywhere. It is ol prime importance in judging and electing our leaders; its dramas influence the vocabularies of our languages and reinforce or detract from our prejudices; its practitioners’ names are household words; young people spend more time watching it than they spend in school. Television may well be the most important innovation in communication since the printing press, and it communi- cates in images that are as much visual and aural as verbal. It employs all the arts, which in turn are synthesized by the art of television itself. For students, learning the vocabularies of all the arts, including the media arts, is an essential tool lor understanding, and perhaps one flay communicating in the medium of television. 5 Television itsell is also changing in ways that will make it easier to use on behalf of the arts. Broadcast is becoming less important as cable and cassette technologies, with their potential for reaching specialized audiences, penetrate the marketplace. The audience share for network television has dropped from 91 percent in 1977 to 69 percent in 1987. The newer technologies have the potential to empower audiences w ith special interests and those with special messages. But if this empowerment is to take place, young people must learn the vocabularies of television. It is something of an anomaly that the schools make little effort to teach young people the rudiments of television’s vocabularies. No one disputes that literature should be a basic part of English studies, if only because the best writers serve as models for students who are learning the craft ol writing. While television is still a new medium and there are as yet lew models that have withstood the test ol time, it is curious that the schools have so far taken little or no interest in educating their students in the art and craft of making images on television. A fourth purpose ol arts education is to provide tools for critical assessment of what one reads, sees and hears. It should provide both models and standards of excellence. It should also provide a sense ol the emotional power of the arts, their ability to stir an audience, both to inspire it and manipulate it. Arts education can give people the tools to make better choices and even to influence the marketplace ol both products and ideas. Every child grow ing up in the United States is bombarded from birth with popular art and artful communication over the airways and on the streets. The purpose of arts education is not to wean young people from these arts (an impossible task even il it were desirable) but to enable them to make reasoned choices about them and what is good and bad. Arts education can help make discriminating consumers. Under- standing the art of design, for example, can lead to better industrial products, as the Japanese understood when they swamped our automobile market. Similarly, knowledge of design enables the citizenry to make informed choices affecting where and how we live. Understanding of the media arts could affect the Nielsen and Arbitron ratings which dictate the broadcast agenda. Several impediments stand in the way ol arts education. According to a 1986 Gallup poll, Americans generally view job preparation as the principal reason forschooling, and knowledge not obviously related tojob skills as relatively unimportant. Our preoccupation with the practical has made education focus on limited basic skills (reading, writing, arithmetic, and now computer literacy) while neglecting education in what those skills 6 THE STATE OF ARTS EDUCATION TODAY are to he used for. Americans also generally confuse the arts with entertainment which can he enjoyed without understanding. Some go so far as to think of the arts as potentially threatening or even blasphemous. Further, because there is little agreement on what arts education should he, there is no agreed course of action to rally those who believe in it. To sum up, the arts are in triple jeopardy: they are not viewed as serious: knowledge ilscll is not viewed as a prime educational objective: and those who determine school curricula do not agree on what arts education is. There is a major gap between the stated commitment /2 Fine Arts (Dance, Drama, Music, Visual Arts) GEORGIA 1 Fine Arts (Dance, Drama, Music, Visual Arts). Vocational Education or Computer Technology HAWAII 1 For academic honors only Art or Music IDAHO 4' Fine Arts (Creative Writing, Dance, Drama, Music, Visual Arts), Foreign Language or Humanities ILLINOIS 1 Art. Music, Foreign Language or Vocational Education INDIANA 2 For students seeking an Honors Diploma LOUISIANA Vi For students in the Regents Program (typically, the college-bound) MAINE l 1 Fine Arts (Visual Arts, Music. Drama) or Forensics MARYLAND l 1 Fine Arts (Dance, Drama, Music, Visual Arts) MISSOURI 1 Music or Visual Arts NEW HAMPSHIRE Vi Arts Education (Art, Music, Visual Arts, Dance. Drama) NEW JERSEY I Fine Arts, Practical Arts or Performing Arts 8 NEW MEXICO Vi Fine Arts (Visual Arts, Music, Dance, Drama). Practical Arts or Education NEW YORK l 2 Dance, Drama, Music, or Visual Arts NEVADA P Fine Arts or Humanities NORTH CAROLINA 1 For students enrolled in the Scholars Program OREGON 1 Music, Visual Arts, Foreign Language or Vocational Education PENNSYLVANIA 2 Arts (Dance, Drama, Music, Visual Arts) or Humanities RHODE ISLAND Vi For college-hound students onl\. Dance, Drama, Music or Visual SOUTH DAKOTA Vi Fine Arts (Dance, Drama, Music, Visual Arts) TENNESSEE 2 For students seeking an Honors Diploma TEXAS 1 For advanced academic program students only. Drama, Music or Visual Ai ls UTAH 1 Vi Dance, Drama, Music or Visual Arts VERMONT 1 General Arts, Dance, Drama, Music or Visual Arts VIRGINIA l * 1 Fine Arts (Art. Music. Dance, Theatre) or Practical Arts WEST VIRGINIA 1 Music, Visual Arts or Applied Arts *States that require some study of I he arts bv every high school student. 1 Effective 1988. 2 Effective 1989. ’ Effective 1992. This table is a revision of one first published in Arts. Education and the States: A Surrey of State Education Policies (Washington. D.C.: Council of Chief State School Officers. 1985). updated with information from the National Art Education Association; Alliance for Arts Education, The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts; and the National Assembly of State Arts Agencies. 9 However, these developments have not resulted in basic arts education. In few' if any school districts in the nation are these stated commitments and resources translated into the kind of actual teaching and learning in the arts that would give all students sequential opportunities to understand and contribute to their civilization, to participate in and develop a sense of the creative and problem-solving process, to communicate and understand communication in visual and aural images as well as words, and to make wise choices among the products of the arts. Arts graduation requirements are often vague and sometimes listed as alternatives to requirements in other subject areas. Of the 29 states that require the arts for high school graduation, 13 accept courses in domestic science, industrial arts, humanities, foreign languages, or computer sciences as alternative ways of meeting them. Only nine states require arts courses per se for all students; seven more require them only for college- bound or honors-program students. Further, college-bound students have little incentive to elect arts courses in high school because many colleges will not accept them for credit. Most elementary school classroom teachers have had little formal training in the arts. Access of elementary school students to arts specialist teachers varies w idely among regions, and except in music is often lacking (see Figure 2). There are few texts and other instructional materials actually available in elementary school arts classrooms. In middle and junior high schools, specialist teachers and instructional materials in fields other than music and the visual arts are usually lacking, and even where they are present, students w ill learn little of the great works of art. High school courses are usually performance oriented and focused on those w ith special talent or interest. Practically no attention is given at any grade level to the media and design arts and dance. Student enrollments in music and visual art courses are substantial in grades seven and eight on a national basis, on the order of half the students in those grades (see Figure 3, p. 24). However, enrollment rates in these subjects drop precipitously in grades nine to 12 (reaching a level on the order of 10 to 20 percent), and enrollments in all other arts courses are low for grades seven to 12 (on the order of 12 to 14 percent). Interestingly, rural districts have higher enrollment rates in music than suburban districts, but lower enrollments in visual arts. On a regional basis, the Northeast has generally the highest enrollments in arts courses (on the order of 80 percent for general music and v isual arts in grades seven and eight) and the West the lowest enrollments (21 percent for general music and 35 percent for visual arts in grades seven and eight). 10 Figure 2. Percentage of Elementary Schools Served by Visual Art and Music Specialists, 1986-87, (50 States and D.C.) NATIONAL Percentage of Elementary Schools Served by Visual Arts Specialists, by Region,* 1986-87 Visual Arts Specialists Not Served Served Part-time Served Full-time West 56% Northeast 35% Central 30% Southeast 39% West 26% Central 26% Southeast 16% West 16% Northeast 50% Percentage of Elementary Schools Served by Music Specialists, In Music Specialists Region.* 1986-87 Not Served Served Part-time Northeast 37% Central 35% 40 Southeast 41% 50 60% Served Full-time West 42% Central 46% Southeast 39% West 37% Northeast 60% Source: Center for Education Statistics. “Public School District Policies and Practices in Selected Aspects of Arts and Humanities Instruction,” U.S. Department of Education Bulletin, February 1988. Figure 5, p. 10 and Table 10. p. 24. *The Northeast includes districts in Connecticut. Delaware, the District of Columbia. Maine. Maryland, Massachusetts. New Hampshire, New Jersey. New York. Pennsylvania. Rhode Island, and Vermont. The Central region includes districts in Illinois. Indiana. Iowa. Kansas, Michigan. Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota. Ohio. South Dakota, and Wisconsin. The Southeast includes districts in Alabama, Arkansas. Florida. Georgia. Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi. North Carolina, South Carolina. Tennessee. V irginia. and West Virginia. The West includes districts in Alaska. Arizona. ( California. Colorado. I tawaii. Idaho. Montana. Nevada. New Mexico, Oklahoma. Oregon, Texas. I tali. Washington, and Wyoming. 11 Figure 3. Student Enrollments in the Arts, Grades 7-12, 1986-87 by National, Regional & Metropolitan Status (50 States and I).C.) Subject and grade Average percentage of student s enrolled or participating All districts Geograph i< ■ region Metropolitan status North- east Central South- east West Urban Sub- urban Rural Music (general) Grades 7-8 48 81 51 45 21 54 42 52 Grades 9-10 12 21 13 9 7 13 8 17 Grades 11-12 9 15 11 7 5 9 7 13 Instrumental music Grades 7-8 23 22 27 17 23 21 23 24 Grades 9-10 16 14 21 13 14 13 15 18 Grades 11-12 14 12 19 12 12 11 14 16 Choral music Grades 7-8 23 27 30 16 16 17 22 26 Grades 9-10 13 13 19 9 9 9 12 15 Grades 11-12 12 1 1 17 9 7 8 12 13 Visual arts Grades 7-8 53 79 59 42 35 58 52 51 Grades 9-10 21 28 24 14 16 22 22 17 Grades 11-12 16 18 21 13 14 15 19 13 Other arts Grades 7-8 14 12 17 9 15 14 14 13 Grades 9-10 12 10 15 10 13 12 12 12 Grades 11-12 13 12 16 10 1 1 12 13 12 Source: Center for Education Statistics, "Public School District Policies and Practices in Selected Aspects o( Arts and Humanities Instruction." U.S. Department of Education Bulletin. February 1988. Tables 8 and 9. pp. 22-28. for a regional listing of states, see Figure 2. 12 Our only sense of student achievement in, and knowledge of the arts comes from the National Assessment of Educational Progress, which twice in the 1970’s assessed student abilities in the visual arts and music. The results were not encouraging. The Assessment reported that in 1979 high school students knew less about music than their peers knew in 1971 . In the visual arts, test performances also declined. There is little reason to believe that the situation has changed for the better. The artistic heritage that is ours and the opportunities to contribute significantly to its evolution are being lost to our young people. In 1982, and again in 1985, we learned that 61 percent of American adults had not attended even once in the previous 12 months a single live performance of jazz, classical music, opera, musical theater, or ballet; nor had they \ isited a museum or art gallery. That 39 percent of adult Americans — over 65 million citizens — did participate in these arts is likely an enormous improvement over, say, 20 years ago. but the fact remains that the cultural heritage and most contemporary expression outside the popular culture of the moment are not part of the lives of most Americans. There is evidence that arts education can make a difference. What should teachers teach in the arts? There is little agreement about I Ik* content of arts education: what should be required, what should be taught separately, what should be integrated into the teaching of other subjects. Nor is there any consensus in arts education about the relative emphasis that should be placed on teaching history, skills, and critical judgment. There is equal confusion about learning goals, how much students can absorb and at what grade levels. There is a consensus that the arts should be taught sequentially, and certain professional associations of arts educators have agreed on comprehensive curricula for their disciplines. However, there is little or no agreement among state and local education agencies about how the variety of the arts should be taught. In short, educational decision makers are bewildered by the question: what should every high school graduate, whether college bound or entering the work force, know about the arts? In most states, curriculum guides are available to local districts. But these guides vary from state to state, and tend to emphasize narrowly focused skill outcomes at the expense of the art form as a w hole and of the cultural significance of great works of art. Because many teachers lack a background in teaching the great works of art. they are unable to overcome this deficiency. Further, the guides tend to replicate existing guides and ignore the best theoretical work available; they also often fail at the elementary school level to provide nonspecialists with the practical information they need for classroom instruction. Two-thirds to three-quarters of school districts provide curriculum 13 Testing and Evaluation guides for music and die visual arts; but only about one-third have them for dance, theater, and creative writing. There are virtually none for the ai ts of design — architecture, urban planning, historic preservation, product and graphic design — although these arts more intimately affect our lives than any except the media arts, for which curriculum guides are also unavailable. Even in music, half the school districts do not have recommended or required textbooks, a situation much worse in the other arts. Secretary of Education William Bennett proposed in December 1987 a model high school curriculum, the graduation requirements of which included a minimum of one semester each in art history and music history. It is the conclusion of the present report that the minimum high school requirement should be two full years involving the arts, to provide all high school students with a basic sense of the history and vocabularies of the arts and their significance in society. It should be remembered that the arts include more than visual art and music; high school requirements should, building on the knowledge and skills learned in elementary and middle school, assure for all students basic familiarity with the contributions of all ibe arts as a condition of obtaining a high school diploma. This minimum two-year requirement might be met either through arts courses per se or through making the arts integral parts of other courses. This conclusion is based on the belief that the basic learning objectives of arts education might be achieved indifferent ways in different schools or districts and that integration of arts components in other courses (e.g.. history) might be an effective way to accomplish at least some of these objectives. Schools have little or no idea what their students are learning about the arts. Nowhere in the country is there any systematic, comprehensive, and formal assessment of student achievement in the arts; nor is the effectiveness of specific arts programs in local school districts generally measured. Only about 6 percent of school districts require district-wide competency tests in the arts for promotion to the next grade. There are three unique problems involved in arts testing. The first is the lack of standardized curricula, texts, and resource materials against which to test; the second is that the arts do not readily lend themselves to easily scorable testing formats; and the third is the dispute among arts educators about whether testing in arts education is a good idea. Nationally, our only sense of student achievement and knowledge of the visual arts and music comes from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), which twice in the 1970's assessed student abilities in those subjects. Although the original NAEP plan provided fora 14 new assessment o( music and visual art at least even six vears. none has been conducted since 1979, and some data from the 1978-79 visual art assessment remain unreported. The Reagan administration has proposed expansion ol NAEP to provide lor state-by-state comparisons. II the NAEP expansion were extended to the arts, it would permit national and state-level assessment and comparisons. Testing in the arts cannot lx* loft exclusively to the state and district levels; they need help in designing and implementing the tests. NAEP is in a unique position to do this. The need to measure individual progress toward curricular goals and objectives and to evaluate the relative effectiveness of arts education programs is as essential as for other subjects. Without testing and evaluation, there is no way to measure individual and program progress, program objectives will lack specificity, and arts courses will continue to be considered extra-curricular and unimportant. As the Dutch experi- ence with testing in the arts demonstrates, what is tested is what is viewed as important. Teachers fhe arts must be taught by teachers knowledgeable in them. At the elementary level, schools often have to rely on general classroom teachers to provide arts instruction; fewer than hall the nation's elementary schools have access to full-time music specialists and only a quarter have access to full-time visual arts specialists (see Figure 2. p. 23). But is the general classroom teacher required to take specific courses or units in the arts in order to be certified to teach? As of 1984, in most states the answer was “no.” Arts specialists, on the other hand, usually have intensive training in their discipline and in how to teach it. Virtually all states certify specialists in visual art and music, but only 24 states certify theater teachers and only 16 certify dance teachers. We know of no state which has established teacher certification programs in the design and media arts. Substantively, teacher preparation programs for arts specialists need to provide more emphasis on history, critical analysis, aesthetics, and the philosophy of the arts il arts education is to provide an understanding ol the artistic heritage, as stipulated in most state curriculum guides. State eredentialing agencies need to strengthen standards for arts teacher preparation programs and develop comprehen- sive examinations for teacher certification. Also, once established in their profession, arts teachers need opportunities to grow in knowledge and expertise; comprehensive, systematic programs for this are few. Recent proposals for reform in the teaching profession — specifically those of the “Holmes Group” and the Carnegie Task Force on Teaching as a Profession — could have important implications for teachers ol the arts, whether generalists, arts specialists, or teachers specializing in subjects other than the arts. The emphasis on a broad liberal arts undergraduate 15 sfc;. j education (with less emphasis on education courses) combined with a proposed requirement for graduate study in education methods could provide greater opportunity at the undergraduate level for substantive education in the arts for the elementary school classroom teacher. But lor the arts specialist, such an approach might detract from the best preparation programs. These combine education In the art form with education in teaching methods and actual practice in classrooms, and employ professors of arts education to leach pedagogy in such a way that methods are not divorced from content. Reform proposals also emphasize that the standing and compensa- tion of teachers must be raised. This is especially critical in light ol the prospective turnover in the teaching profession as many teachers approach retirement. Shortages of arts teachers exist even now in schools. The children ol the “baby boom ’ generation will intensify the demand for more teachers, including arts teachers. To meet these demands, more attention must be paid to improving the professional environment for teachers so as to encourage new entrants into the teaching force. Consideration also needs to be given to encouraging and credentialing qualified practicing artists and arts professionals to supplement arts teachers, particularly where shortages exist. Research Although most arts education research is conducted by college and university professors who must personally subsidize their own efforts, American researchers continue to produce a small but vital body of research that surpasses that of other countries in volume and quality. Unfortunately, most of this research is confined to the visual arts and music and fails to reach teachers in schools. Baseline and trend data are lacking on the goals and objectives ol arts education programs, enrollment in such programs, staffing patterns, and instructional and assessment practices. There is also a severe lack of research about how young people leant about the arts and what they can be expected to learn at what ages. The federally sponsored Educational Research Information Center (ERIC) regularly publishes abstracts on education, but is incomplete in its coverage of arts education. The Arts Endowment, working with the U.S. Department ol Education, is attempting a modest remedy here. The two agencies have collaborated in developing state and school-district-level data, and in September 1987 established research centers for arts and literature education. It is hoped that these centers, together with an Elementary Subjects Center (which includes the arts), will provide a national resource for educational decision makers and arts education professionals. 17 Leadership The arts are taught in schools because concerned citizens value them. If they are to be taught well, they must have the support of all four sectors that affect arts education: the governance, education, arts, and business- producer sectors. The governance sector, which includes elected and appointed government officials as well as parents and the voters, sets the societal goals to be achieved by education. The education sector, which includes education agencies, administrators, teachers, and professional associations, implements educational programs. The arts sector creates, produces, presents, exhibits, and preserves the arts. The business- producer sector produces materials, supplies, and equipment for use in schools. To make arts education an educational priority and a part of general education reform in the United States requires leadership from individ- uals and organizations in each of the four sectors. To do this, they must (i) have a consensus on the nature of arts education and how it can be accomplished, (ii) understand the factors that will lead to change, and (iii) work together to effect that change. Individuals and organizations within each of the four sectors must transcend their special interests and work together if arts education is to become a basic and sequential part of the curriculum. All members of the education sector must understand that providing basic arts education is a fundamental part of their responsibility, and thus in their professional interest to implement. The arts can only become integrated into the basic curriculum through the efforts of the education sector. However, the advocacy of arts education programs cannot just be left to the arts educators alone, for they lack the clout by themselves to make the arts a national priority. Initiatives from outside the education sector need to be coordinated with state and locally mandated school programs. Within the education sector, leadership in schools and school districts is most important. While the efforts of the arts teachers are ol the highest importance, leadership of school and school district admin- istrators (principals and superintendents) and of school boards is equally essential. Where this leadership is present, the arts can become a basic and the schools can make a difference; where it is not. they cannot. In exercising this leadership, school administrators must have as high expectations for arts education and provide for as 1 requent assessment ol student progress as they do for other basic subjects. Arts education has high standing in principle in the governance sector. Presidents of the United States, from George Washington on, have affirmed the importance ol the arts. Congress is similarly on record, changing the purposes of the enabling legislation of the National Endowment for the Arts and requesting this report. So are state 18 legislatures, as evidenced by the enactment o( new graduation requirements in the arts by some states and in the 1983 ((‘solution of the National Conference of State Legislatures. The National Congress of Parents and Teachers (the National PTA) has stated that the integration of the arts in the elementary, secondary, and continuing education curriculum is a “goal of the highest priority.” In the education sector, the National School Boards Association, the Council of Chief State School Officers, the Board of the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, the American Federation of Teachers, the National Education Association, and the College Board have all called for making the arts a more basic and sequential part of K-12 education. Of particular interest is the 1988 resolution of the Executive Council of the American Federation ol Teachers: The basic school curriculum, K-12, as a part of a balanced course of study in the arts, sciences and humanities, should require all students to study the arts. Students should be required to study the literary arts; the visual arts including design and architecture; the performing arts including music, dance, opera and theater; and the media arts in order to ensure that all students w ill be able to develop their creative potential and graduate from high school with a basic understanding of their society and of civilization. The U.S. Department of Education and Secretary William Bennett have shown particular commitment to aits education as a basic. In his 1986 report on elementary education. First Lessons , Secretary Bennett declared that the “arts are an essential element of education just like reading, writing and arithmetic." His 1987 booklet containing sugges- tions for a core curriculum for American high school students, James Madison High School: A Curriculum for American Students, recommended one semester each in art history and music history. Secretary Bennett has also spoken out on behalf of arts education on several occasions. The arts sector has always had a major interest in arts education, although its primary efforts appropriately involve artistic creation, production, presentation, exhibition, and preservation. Both artists and arts institutions have, nonetheless, undertaken extensive and important programs of educational value. The commercial media of television, radio, the movies, recording, and publishing are most pervasive; young people spend more time in front of the television set than in school, and the popular culture is a part of the basic vocabulary of all young people. State and local arts agencies, in addition to the National Endowment for the Arts, assist arts education in schools in their states and localities, primarily through funding, with Endowment help, artist residencies. Arts 19 The Endowment sector advocates and trustees of arts institutions can he a major force on behalf o( arts education, in some cases the only force. But, to he more effective, they need to mesh their efforts more closely with those in the education sector who have the responsibility to implement education programs. The business-producer sector needs to he encouraged to do more for arts education. Of particular importance are the textbooks and audio- visual materials without which teachers cannot teach. Ways need to he found to induce this sector to produce and market these materials in areas presently lacking them. Today, only in music does one find complete sets of such materials. The National Endowment for the Arts is to arts education what the National Endowment lor the Humanities and the National Science Foundation are to humanities and science education. The Arts Endowment has from its inception assisted arts education, primarily through its Arts in Education Program. Until recently, the program concentrated on f unding state arts agencies to place artists in residence in schools and other educational settings. In addition, many of the Endowment's discipline programs have funded arts institutions to undertake educational projects of various kinds. While the Endowments Challenge Program lias in the past occasionally funded educational institutions, it was changed in 1987, in part so as to target assistance to projects which could develop “deeper and broader education in and appreciation of the arts.” In 1986. based on recommendations of the National Council on the Arts and following extensive field consultations, the Endowment shifted the thrust of its Arts in Education Program towards encouraging collaboration between state arts agencies and state education agencies in order to convince the education sector that it was its responsibility and in its interest to make the arts a basic and sequential part of k-12 education. This shift was occasioned by Congress’s making arts education a principal purpose of the Endowments enabling legislation and hv the Endowment’s discovery, in its 1982 Public Participation in the Arts survey, that 61 percent of adult Americans were not participating in many of the arts the Endowment supports. It is the view of the Endowment and of the National Council on the Arts that one vital function of federal support of the arts is to help all Americans become familiar with and understand the great variety of art that lies outside the popular culture of the moment. The key to this is learning about the arts. Notwithstanding the Endowments increased emphasis on arts education, it spends less time and money, as a proportion of its overall activ ities, on arts education than do its counterpart agencies, the National 20 CONCLUSION Endowment for the Humanities and the National Science Foundation, on humanities and science education. The Arts Endowment spends 3.3 percent of its current budget for its Arts in Education Program, compared to 12.8 percent of the Humanities Endowment's budget for humanities education and just over 5 percent of the Science Foundation's much larger budget for science education. These differences derive from the (act that the Arts Endowment has traditionally focused its support on professional artists and arts institutions rather than education while the Humanities Endowment and the National Science Foundation have, from their beginnings, considered education to be one ol their principal priorities. These differences may stem in part from the general perception that education in the humanities and sciences is necessary to understand, appreciate and use them, while the “serious’’ arts, like entertainment, can be experienced without knowing anything about them. Any effort to make the arts a sequential part of basic education will necessarily take considerable time. Even if every school district in the nation were to agree tomorrow that sequential courses in the arts are essential to a proper education, it would be 13 years before the first student had completed a K.-12 curriculum. The results of years of neglect in arts education are evident in what adults say about their experiences in it. According to the Endowments 1985 Survey ol Public Participation in the Arts, most Americans say they have never had any form of arts instruction at all: 53 percent said “no when asked if they had lessons or classes in music; 75 percent said “no to lessons in the visual arts; 84 percent said “no to lessons in ballet; 82 percent said “no” to lessons in creative writing. Eighty-four percent said they had never studied visual art appreciation; 80 percent said they had never studied music appreciation. Any instruction in music or the visual arts was likely to have occurred between the ages of 12 and 17, and music or visual arts appreciation courses were likely to have been taken only in college. This, of course, works to the disadvantage of those lacking higher education (see Figure 4). Young people missing out on arts education not only fail to become culturally literate, they miss the joy and excitement of learning the skills of creation and problem solving in the arts. They learn neither how to communicate their thoughts and dreams nor how to interpret the communication of the thoughts and dreams of others. They miss out on learning the tools to discriminate and to make reasoned choices among the products of the arts. As John Adams, our second President, w rote to his wife, Abigail, young Americans have “a right" to this. They should not miss out. 21 Figure 4. Visual Art and Music Appreciation Courses Adults Polled in 1985 on Their Childhood Experiences Source: Robinson. J. P., et al., "Survey of Public Participation in the Arts: 1985. Vol. 1, Project Report." December 1986. p. 371. Prepared under Cooperative Agreement NEA CA 85-24 with the National Endowment for the Arts. Washington. D.C. VISUAL ART What percentage of adults took visual For those who took courses, what were art history/appreciation courses by the their ages at the time? time they were 24 years of age? MUSIC What percentage of adults took music appreciation courses by the time they were 24 years of age? For those who took courses, what were their ages at the time? RECOMMENDATIONS 1. Arts education should provide all students with a sense of the arts in civilization, of creativity in the artistic process, of die vocabularies of artistic communication, and of the critical elements necessary to making informed choices about the products of the arts. 2 . State education agencies and local school districts should adopt and implement explicit policies to make such arts education a sequential part of the basic curriculum for all students in grades K- 12. These policies should define die curriculum to include each of the arts (dance, design, literature and creative w riting, the media arts, music, opera and musical theater, theater, and the visual arts) and provide for instruction in history and critical analysis as well as production and performance. Most important, the policies should define a core of subject content and skills in the arts which all students would be required to achieve, and provide for a selection of required courses in relation to optional courses in die basic curriculum. It is particularly important that the policies include provision for the all-pervasive design and media arts. The policies should also provide for time, money, and qualified personnel to develop compre- hensive and sequential curricula, instruction based on the curricula, and testing of student achievement and evaluation of school programs. To this end: A. State education agencies and school districts should identify, and achieve consensus on, the minimum knowledge and skills (in terms of student learning outcomes) that would satisfy state or district-mandated high school graduation requirements. B. Elementary schools should consider providing arts instruction, exclusive of English studies, for approximately 15 percent of the school week consistent with the aims of professional arts education associations. Four-and-a-half hours of arts instruction in a 30-hour elementary school week is fairly minimal if students are to gain a sense of the arts as described above. C. Junior high and middle schools (grades 6 through 8) should require all students to take arts instruction, exclusive of English studies, for at least 15 percent of the school year (the average for the majority of students in grades 7 and 8 is estimated at 17 percent). These requirements might be fulfilled through survey courses, through study of at least two of the arts, or through instruction integrated with other academic courses. The cur- riculum should specifically require study of the design and media arts, and teachers should be trained to teach these subjects. Toward an Arts Curriculum 23 [). High schools should require all students satisfactorily to complete two full years (or two Carnegie units) involving the arts (not as an alternative to courses like foreign languages or computer sciences) in order to receive a graduation diploma. The purpose is to provide all high school students with a basic sense of the history and vocabularies of the arts and their significance in society. This purpose might be achieved either through arts courses per se or through making the arts integral parts of other courses. High schools and school systems will have to certify which of their courses meet this purpose. They may also wish to consider a seven- period day in accommodating these and other increased requirements. E. High schools should also offer optional introductory, intermediate, and advanced courses in each of the arts so that those interested and/or talented in an art form might be able to pursue that interest and talent. F. State education agencies and school districts should engage knowl- edgeable experts to coordinate arts curriculum development and evaluation. The experts should work closely with teachers and school administrators, and with theoreticians and researchers, in order to employ the best available thinking in this effort. The experts should also engage the resources ol artists, arts, and cultural institutions, teacher- training institutions, and commercial producers ol classroom materials. G. State and local education budgets should provide for making appropriate arts materials (e.g., textbooks, teacher manuals, and audio- visual aids) available to students and teachers. Where such materials do not exist, state education agencies and school districts should collaborate in developing incentives for their production. l he Case for Testing and Evaluation in the Arts 1. As in other subjects, students should be tested in the arts and their art work evaluated in order to determine what they have learned, and arts education programs should be evaluated to determine their ellectiveness. 2. State departments of education, local school districts and schools should identify, implement, and evaluate procedures to test student achieve- ment and evaluate arts education programs on a comparative basis. To this end: A. Each school district should implement a comprehensive testing program in the arts based on the district's arts curriculum. The program should address creation, performance, history, critical analysis, and the [ilace ol the arts in society, and use both quantitative and qualitative measures to determine whether the student is achieving the curriculum s learning objectives. 24 B. Each school district should implement an evaluation program which assesses the merit of tin* curriculum, adherence to it, the adequacy of resources allocated to implement it, and the level of student achievement. C. Each state education agency should develop evaluation procedures to evaluate district and school arts programs on a comparative basis in terms of state arts education goals. D. Each state education agency should provide technical assistance to school districts to help them develop student testing and program evaluation procedures. 3. The U.S. Department of Education and the National Endowment for the Arts should work together to restore to the National Assessment of Educational Progress assessments in visual art, music, and literature. The NAEP writing assessment should include creative writing. Before t In- next NAEP reauthorization, methods for assessing theater, dance, the design arts, and media arts should be developed, including development of prototype questions. Remaining data from the 1979 visual art assessment which are still unreleased should be scored, analyzed, and released as soon as possible. 1. Teacher Preparation and Certification. State certifying agencies should strengthen arts certification requirements for all teachers whose responsibilities include the arts. Training of all teachers — elementary school classroom teachers, specialist arts teachers, and teachers of other subjects to which the arts are relevant — should include (i) study of important works ol art (their craft, history, and significance to the civilizations which they symbolize) and (ii) study of techniques for creating or performing one of the arts. To this end: A. For elementary school classroom teachers , each state certifying agenc\ should establish arts requirements for certification: over half of the states do not have such requirements. These requirements should include at least two courses in the arts which stress content. B. For K-1'2 arts specialists , each state certifying agency should require training in the history and critical analysis of the art form, as well as in production and performance. 1 lalf the university course work should be in the art discipline, and methods courses in arts education should be made an integral part ol substantive instruction in the arts, not separated out as recommended in the Holmes and Carnegie reports. University courses in the arts disciplines should, where relevant, draw on the standards and recommendations of the National Association of Schools of Art and 25 Design, the National Association of Schools of Music, the National Association of Schools of Theatre, and the National Association of Schools of Dance. Faculty responsible for teaching these courses should test their ideas about arts teaching in actual teaching situations in elementary and secondary classrooms. C. Teacher recruitment and certification in the arts of dance, design, the media, and theater should be strengthened and instituted in those states which do not now provide for them. D. In a time when we are likely to face a shortage of qualified arts teachers, state certifying agencies should develop and implement flexible procedures that provide for special testing and certification of experi- enced practicing artists and arts professionals who can demonstrate a comprehensive background in the arts and substantial knowledge of the issues and methodology of k-12 arts education. E. For teachers of other subjects (such as history, geography, and foreign languages), state certifying agencies and colleges and universities should require a basic general education in the arts. The arts are related to all school subjects, and all teachers should understand them well enough to use them to support and elucidate instruction in other subjects and to show how such subjects can contribute to an understanding of the arts. F. Testing ofleacher qualifications should be mandated as a condition of teacher certification. State certifying agencies should develop tests to evaluate teacher preparation and teacher preparation programs. Such tests should assess the general (liberal arts) preparation of teachers, their knowledge of art in the context of history and culture, their ability to analyze art, their performance and skill competencies, their knowledge of issues in arts education, and their skill in lesson planning and pedagogy. G. Teacher preparation programs should emphasize the importance of working w ith local artists and arts institutions and provide information on how to draw on them. 2 . Teacher Recruitment. Arts education professional associations, state departments of education, colleges and universities, and arts schools should undertake efforts to attract capable students to arts teacher preparation programs, including minority students. Special efforts should be made to recruit dance, design, media, and drama teachers. 26 3 . Teacher Professional Development. Arts teachers, no less than teachers of other subjects, should be provided with opportunities to advance within their profession. Slate education agencies and school districts should develop standards and incentives to this end, and should promote career mobility within the school, district, region, or stale. Such incentives should include full or partial reimbursement of expenses for summer studies and for attending professional meetings and conferences. 4 . Teaching Environment. Local school districts should, consistent with state and local mandates, provide arts teachers with maximum flexibilitv to meet the individual needs of specific classes. They should also provide arts teachers with adequate compensation, facilities, administrative support, and teaching materials. 5. Optimum Staffing. Each school district should aim to provide arts instruction by trained arts specialists at all levels K- 12. To this end: A. Elementary school administrators should recruit teacher curriculum coordinators for each of the arts. Where available, arts specialists should be given this responsibility; where they are not available, classroom teachers with particular interests and qualifications in the arts should serve as coordinators in the interim. Coordinators should be given time and resources and be responsible for developing sequential arts programming, for assembling necessary resources, and for assisting teachers. Professional arts education associations, artists, and arts organizations can help the coordinators in these efforts. B. Elementary school administrators should, especially in the upper elementary grades, assign the best arts teachers to teach the arts in several classrooms in addition to their own. In such a program, students would benefit from competent instruction and the number of subjects for which teachers would have to prepare would be reduced. C. In middle, junior high, and high schools, all arts classes should continue to lie taught by arts specialists, or if no arts specialist is available, by qualified people in the community, including experienced artists or arts professionals. Research Priorities in Arts Education More sustained support is needed to improve research in arts education. Such support should help attract better graduate students, assist apprenticeships, and permit the best researchers to undertake significant long-term studies on arts education. Research priorities should be thoughtfully established by f unders in consultation w ith arts educators in 27 Fred Astaire in Top Hat, courtesy of the American Film Institute, Washington 28 order (i) to improve classroom instruction and (ii) to achieve a balance between the interests of individual researchers and general research needs. To this end: A. National, state, and local funders (public and private) should increase their priority for arts education research. B. The U. S. Department of Education and the National Endowment for the Arts should explore ways to assure that educational statistics, surveys, and reports cover the arts with the same attention and detail as for other school subjects. One of the Educational Resource Information Centers (ERIC) should enter into the system the large backlog of documents from previously published arts education research and periodically survey current sources of information to be entered into the system in the future. C. Reports should be generated to synthesize and disseminate the results of completed studies, to make them available to classroom teachers and serve as bases for further research. I). Comprehensive baseline data should be collected and periodically updated to establish trend lines concerning the extent to which education programs in each of the arts are in fact established in states and school districts. These should include data on curricula and course offerings, teachers, student enrollment, materials, facilities, classroom time, budgets, administrative support, testing and evaluation techniques, and learning outcomes. E. Research is needed to learn what kinds of teacher training, cui rieulum development, instructional methodology, and resources are most effective in improving arts education. E Research is needed to tell us what can and should be taught at what ages and how it can best be taught. Research should be included on the complete act of learning — students interactions with teachers, the use of resources in specific classrooms, and the influence of the family and environment on learning in the arts in comparison to learning in other subjects. Research is needed to provide more information on how students acquire knowledge of, and learn to interpret, the arts; how students perceive, value, perform, create, and use the arts; and how learning in die arts broadens perspective, gives a sense of the human condition, and fosters reasoning ability. 29 Leadership in Arts Education The Role of the National Endowment for the Arts The governance, education, arts and business-producer sectors should work together to convince parents and political and education leaders at the state, district, and local levels that education is complete and acceptable only when the arts are included as essential components sequentially taught. Making the case for arts education to state and local leadership is a political job requiring greater effort than it does for school subjects that large segments of the public already perceive to be basic. To this end: A. National, state, and local arts education advocates need (i) to develop greater consensus on the objectives of arts education — what students are expected to learn at what ages, (ii) to obtain official recognition of the importance of arts education from the highest levels of political leadership — and then (iii) to work cooperatively to plan for and implement effective programs in school districts and schools (as a part of general education reform). B. The case for arts education should be made in the same way as for any other subject: i.e., for sequential and testable instruction by qualified teachers, with high school graduation requirements that specify the arts (not in the alternative with other subjects), and with adequate time, money, curricula, and materials. C. State education and arts agencies should work cooperatively with regional and local education and arts agencies, professional organiza- tions, artists and arts institutions to provide leadership and support for improving arts education. D. At the local level, community leaders (in particular the trustees of arts organizations) should work with local school boards, parent-teacher associations and schools to ensure that the arts are in fact sequentially taught in schools by qualified teachers for all students (not just the gifted and talented). E. Programs should be instituted to help local school board members and education administrators understand why it is their responsibility, and thus in their interest, to make arts education a priority. These programs should help local school board members and education administrators to provide leadership for this part, as for other parts, of the curriculum. The National Endowment for the Arts, which is to arts education what the National Science Foundation is to science education, should (i) make the case for arts education, (ii) facilitate collaboration among the four sectors concerned with arts education (governance, education, arts, business- 30 producer) to make it a basic and sequential part of school instruction, and (iii) assist development and distribution of curricular, instructional, and assessment models for the benefit of state and local education authorities. To this end: A. The policies and resources (staff and money) of the Endowment for arts education should be continued and strengthened over a period of at least 10 years in order to allow implementation of present pol icies and of the recommendations in this report to bear fruit. The Fiscal Year 1989 budget request for the Endowment's Arts in Education Program providers for such strengthening in that year. B. The Endowment should provide the President and the Congress a report on progress in arts education in preparation for the Endowments reauthorization in the mid- 90s (the reauthorization which follows anticipated reauthorization in 1990). C. The Endowment should advocate the development of higher standards for state and local arts curriculum guides, courses, and curriculum materials. It should provide limited funding to assist state/local curriculum development. It should, in cooperation with the U.S. Department of Education, convene a meeting of experts to review curricular materials (including the work on curricula of the new national research centers on the arts, literature, and elementary subjects) with a view to making recommendations on arts curricula and on school programs to implement them. D. The Endowment should work with the U.S. Department of Education to develop a plan for the inclusion of each of the arts in the National Assessment of Educational Progress. The plan should include analysis of whether arts education might best be assessed by (i) separate assessments for each of the individual arts, (ii) a general arts assessment, (iii) integrating arts assessments with other subject area assessments, or (iv) a combination of these. E. The Endowment should provide limited funding to assist state-level development of model assessment plans, programs and procedures, both with respect to programs and student testing. F. The Endowment should encourage (i) state education agencies and arts education associations to recruit highly qualified arts teachers; (ii) state certifying agencies to raise standards for teacher certification and teacher preparation programs accreditation; and (iii) school boards to 31 Frank Stella, Quaqiin! Attaccati La! 4.r, 1985, Hirshliorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institution, Washington 32 :< Hr hire qualified arts teachers. The Kndowment should encourage the arts sector to lend support to these efforts. G. The Kndowment should continue to identify areas in which there is a need for systematic and regular collection of baseline survey data on arts education, and it should disseminate the results of its studies and data to the arts education communities and the public. The Endowment should also provide limited funding to assist efforts to translate research into classroom practice. H. The Endowment should appoint an ongoing Advisory Board (with representatives of the governance, education, arts, and business-pro- ducer sectors) whose purpose would be to institute a national dialogue on: (i) what students, at a minimum, should know of and about the arts when they graduate from high school, (ii) how required course units might be structured to include teaching of these minimum requirements, and (iii) what evaluation mechanisms might be appropriate and effective to assess whether students have actually mastered such materials and skills. The Advisory Board should specifically advise the Endowment on: (i) activities and efforts which it could undertake to ensure that the recommendations in this report are addressed by the appropriate parties, (ii) development (with appropriate agencies and associa- tions) of proposals for a master plan for arts assessment as part of the National Assessment of Educational Progress, (iii) development of a plan by which exemplary school and district arts programs might be identified, recognized, and rewarded (e.g., exemplary schools, programs and teachers); and (iv) the report to the President and Congress suggested for the Endowments mid-’90's re- authorization. I. The Endowment should provide a national model for the kind of collaboration necessary to make progress in arts education. The model should in particular include the U.S. Department of Education, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the national associations that can influence arts education. The Endowment should assist states, localities, and the arts education community generally to develop a clear- er vision of what arts education in the United States can and should be. 33 WHAT OUR PRESIDENTS HAVE SAID ABOUT THE ARTS George Washington Letter to Reverend Joseph Hillard, March 22, 1781 “The arts and sciences essential to the prosperity of the state and to the ornament and happiness of human life have a primary claim to the encouragement of every lover of his country and mankind." John Adams Letter to Abigail Adams May 12, 1780 “I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. My sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history and naval architecture, naviga- tion, commerce, and agriculture, in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture. . . . Thomas Jefferson “You see I am an enthusiast on the subject of the arts. But it is an Letter to James Madison, September 20, 1785 enthusiasm of which I am not ashamed, as its object is to improve the taste ol my countrymen, to increase their reputation, to reconcile to them the respect ol the world, and procure them its praise." Franklin I). Roosevelt Address at Temple University, Philadelphia, PA February 22, 1936 “Inequality may linger in the world ol material things, but great music, great literature, great art and the wonders of science are, and should be, open to all." Dwight D. Eisenhower Remarks at opening of new America /; galleries at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, October 24, 1957 “Art is a universal language and through it each nation makes its own unique contribution to the culture of mankind. John F. Kennedy Remarks on behalf of the National Cultural Center National Guard Armory November 29, 1962 “Art and the encouragement of art is political in the most profound sense, not as a weapon in the struggle, but as an instrument of understanding of the futility of struggle between those who share man’s faith. Aeschylus and Plato are remembered today long after the triumphs of imperial Athens are gone. Dante outlived the ambitions ol 13th-century Florence. Goethe stands serenely above the politics of Germany, and 1 am certain that after the dust of centuries has passed over our cities, we too will be remembered not for victories or defeats in battle or politics, but for our contribution to the human spirit. . . ." 34 Lyndon B. Johnson Remarks at signing of the Arts and Humanities Bill, September 29, 1965 Richard M. Nixon Address at the Annual Con ference of the Associated Councils of the Arts, May 26, 1971 Gerald R. Ford Message to the Congress, transmitting Annual Report of the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Council on the Arts June 23. 1976 Jimmy Carter Remarks at a White House Reception National Conference of Artists April 2, 1980 Ronald Reagan Remarks at the National Medal of Arts White House Luncheon, June 18, 1987 Art is a nation's most precious heritage. For it is in our works of art that we reveal to ourselves, and to others, the inner vision which guides us as a Nation. And where there is no vision, the people perish." We, this Nation of ours, could he the richest nation in the world. We could be the most powerful nation in the world. We could be the freest nation in the world — hut only il the arts are alive and flourishing can we experience the true meaning of our freedom, and know the full glory of the human spirit. Our Nation has a diverse and extremely rich cultural heritage. It is a source of pride and strength to millions of Americans who look to the arts for inspiration, communication and the opportunity for creative self-expression " “The relationship between government and art must necessarily be a delicate one. It would not be appropriate for the government to try to define what is good or what is true or what is beautiful. Rut government can provide nourishment to the ground within which these ideas spring forth from the seeds of inspiration within the human mind. . . . “Why do we, as a free people, honor the arts? Well, the answer is both simple and profound. The arts and the humanities teach us who we are and what we can be. They lie at the very core of the culture of which we’re a part, and they provide the foundation from which we may reach out to other cultures so that the great heritage that is ours may be enriched by — as well as itself enrich — other enduring traditions. 35 THE CONGRESSIONAL MANDATE In 1985, the 99th Congress called for a “study of the state of arts education” as part of t he reauthorization of the National Endowment for the Arts. This was the second such request in history. The first, more than a hundred years ago. was a request hy the 46th Congress for the report. Art and Industry , Instruction in I Inuring Applied to Industrial and Fine Arts, which was completed by Isaac Edwards Clarke in 1884. That report reflected our national aspirations for culture and our sense of inferiority as we measured ourselves against Europe. Now, over a century later. Congress has mandated another report on the state of arts education in the United States. Insecurity about our ability to compete in world markets has reappeared; but this time Congress has made it clear that cultural, not economic, welfare is the concern: The Committee believes that arts and humanities education is central to the stated purpose of this Act which includes encouraging national progress and scholarship in the humanities and the arts, making citizens masters of their technology, becoming a nation which is a leader in ideas and spirit, and bringing to all our citizens a better understanding of the past and a better view of the future. Concern about the breadth and quality of education in American schools was highlighted in the 1983 report of the National Commission on Excellence in Education, A Nation at Risk. Since then a rash of books and reports have publicized the erosion of education standards, the decline in test scores and, especially, the glaring lack of cultural knowledge and awareness on the part of most high school graduates. These studies agree that while time must be set aside for students to master modern skills, such as computer sciences, achievement of computer literacy must not substitute for literacy in the culture that all Americans share. I he 1987 best-seller status achieved by Allan Bloom s The (dosing of the American Mind and E.D. Hirsch, Jr.’s Cultural Literary testifies to the fact that far from being a passing fad, worry about the cultural aspects of education is growing. Increasingly, this concern is focusing on what, if anything, our children are learning about the arts and the humanities which together are at the center of culture and civilization. Many of the conclusions in Toward Civilization echo those reached in the report of the National Endowment for the Humanities, American Memory, published in August 1987. We strongly endorse the Humanities 37 Endowments condemnation of teaching that emphasizes narrow skills at the expense of content and understanding; we agree that the teaching ol literature has deteriorated sharply since its subsumption under the so-called "language arts"; and we strongly support the Humanities Endowments plea for increasing the hours devoted to history, the only discipline through which our children can gain both a sense of kinship with the great thinkers and doers of the past, and a foundation from which to transmit their own culture to future generations. Isaac Clarkes first report to Congress comprised seven volumes. They were filled with legislative actions, school-committee records and reports, interviews with officials, local histories, speeches, and statistics. Toward Civilization is only one volume, but it captures the essence of the problem and points to practical ways in which the improvement of arts education might be addressed. Written to fulfill the congressional mandate. Toward Civilization is also intended as an open letter to the American people, to the education community, to those who love the arts and understand their importance in education. For it is in the peoples hands that the future of arts education rests. SOURCE MATERIALS Toward Civilization relies heavily on two recent surveys conducted with the support of the U.S. Department of Education: one at the state level and one at the school district level. The 1985 Arts, Education and the States report sets out the findings of a 1984 survey of state education agencies undertaken by the Council of Chief State School Officers. (The survey was jointly sponsored by the Rockefeller Foundation, the U.S. Department of Education and the National Endowment for the Arts.) The 1988 "Public School District Policies and Practices in Selected Aspects of Arts and Humanities Instruction" report sets out the findings of a 1987 survey of a national probability sample of 700 school districts. This survey was undertaken especially for this report to Congress as a joint project by the U.S. Department of Education, which funded it. in collaboration with the National Endowment for the Humanities and the National Endowment for the Arts. As directed by Congress, Toward Civilization contains a synthesis of the information and insights contained in previous studies. It includes, among other things, review of 3.000 Educational Resource Information Center (ERIC) abstracts on arts education; the 1985 report by the Music Educators National Conference, Arts in Schools: State by State ; the 1986 report by Mills and Thomson for the National Art Education Association, A National Survey of Art(s) Education. 1984-85: A National Report on the State of the Arts in the States: John Goodlad s A Place Called School (1984); Laura Chapmans Instant Art, Instant 38 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS (Aillure: The Unspoken Policy Jor American Schools (1982); Ernest Boyers High School (1983); Theodore Sizers Horaces Compromise ( 1984); A Nation Prepared: Teachers for the 21st Century ( 1989). Irom the Carnegie Forum on Education and the Economy; Time for Results: The Governors 1991 Report on Education (1989); the 1984 Band Corpora- tion report by Day el ah; Art History , Art Criticism, and Art Production: An Examination of Art Education in Selected School Districts (prepared for the Getty Center for Education in the Arts); and the National Assessment of Educational Progress first and second assessments of art and music (1974 and 1981) and the writing assessment (1986). We also reviewed arts curriculum guides Irom stales and local school districts, books relating to education in the various arts, textbooks used by children for arts instruction, and textbooks list'd for the education of arts teachers. Interviews were conducted with education authorities, members of state and local arts agencies, representatives of professional associations, representatives of arts advocacy groups, teachers, supervisors, school administrators, pub- lishers, testmakers, and members of the public. Fhe study was undertaken in cooperation with the U.S. Department of Education and in consultation v\ ith the Committee on Labor and Human Resources of the Senate and the Committee on Education and Labor of the House of Representatives. Many people have contributed to this report. We sought information, advice, and assistance from educators, artists, academics, professional associations, arts organizations, stall' and local agencies, and others. Many invested considerable time in helping us. We are grateful to all of them. We are particularly grateful to Representative Pat Williams, Chairman of the House Subcommittee on Postsecondary Education, whose deep concern for the quality and availability of arts education has contributed much to our efforts in this area. We are grateful to Representative E. Thomas Coleman and Representative Steve Bartlett for their help and interest in this effort and to Representative James M. Jeffords for arranging hearings on this subject in 1984. We are also grateful to Senators Claiborne Pell and Robert T. Stafford for their leadership in our reauthorization and for the leadership and support in this area of our appropriations committees who have approved funding for arts education over the years, in particular Representatives Sidney R. Yates and Ralph Regula and Senators Robert C. By rd and James A. McClure. Particular thanks are due to Chester E. Finn, Jr., Assistant Secretary of Education (Office of Educational Research and Improve- 39 mi l it ) and Counselor to the Secretary o! Education, and his staff, lor llieii invaluable assistance. We also wish to extend heartfelt thanks to Professoi Brent W ilson ol Pennsylvania Stale University, who contributed so much to drafting this report: to Kate L. Moore, Jeanne C. Rhinelander, and Ruth Berenson ol the Endowments executive staff; and to Warren Bennett Newman. Direcloi ol the Endowment's Arts in Education Program and Doug Herbert, Assistant Director. I heir contributions have been indispensable to the compilation ol this document. f mally. we are especially indebted to the members of the National Council on the Arts and the Endowment's Advisory Committee, organized specifically to guide preparation of this report. Council and committee members were consulted throughout the study process and prov idl'd invaluable adv ice. Representing a variety of artistic disciplines and points ol view about arts education, committee members contributed immeasurably not only to the planning of this report but to its contents. Parthenon, Athens, courtesy ol the Creek National Tourist Organization 40 NATIONAL COUNCIL ON THE ARTS Frank Hodsoll Chairman David IN. Baker Jazz Artist, Composer, Chairman of the Jazz Department. Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana. Phyllis Berney Arts Patron, Trustee, Former Member, Wisconsin Ails Board, Eau Claire, Wisconsin. Sally Brayley Bliss Former Dancer and Artistic Director, Jeffrey II Dancers. Trustee, Oyster Bay, New \ork. Nina Brock Former Chairman, Tennessee Arts Commission, Lookout Mountain, Tennessee. C. Douglas Dillon Art Collector and Patron, Former Chairman, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Former Secretary of the Treasury, Trustee, New York. New York. Allen Drury Novelist, Tiburon, California. Joseph Epstein Writer, Critic, Editor, American Scholar ; Evanston, Illinois. Helen Frankenthaler Painter, New York, New York. Robert Garfias Ethnomusicologist, Dean of Fine Arts, University ol California at Irvine, Irvine, California. Margaret Hillis Director, Chicago Symphony Chorus, Chicago, Illinois. Celeste Holm Actress, New York, New York. Boh Johnson State Senator, Former Chairman, Florida Arts Council, Sarasota. Florida. M. Rav Kingston Architect, Former Chairman. Utah Arts Council. Salt Lake City, Utah. Ardis Krainik General Manager, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois. Raymond J. Learsy Art Collector, Former Publisher, Trustee, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York. New York. Harvey Lichtenstein President and Executive Producer. Brooklyn Academy of Music, Brooklyn, New York. 41 Samuel Lipman Music Critic, Publisher, New Criterion , Artistic Director, Waterloo Music Festival, New York, New York. Talbot MacCarthy Trustee and Former Chairman, Missouri State Council on the Arts, St. Louis, Missouri. Arthur Mitchell Choreographer, Executive/Artistic Director, Dance Theatre of Harlem, Former Dancer, New York City Ballet. New York. New York. Carlos Moseley Former President and Chairman, New York Philharmonic, Spartan- burg, South Carolina. Jacob Neusner Writer, Ungerleider Distinguished Scholar of Judaic Studies, Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island. Lloyd Richards Artistic Director, Yale Repertory Theatre, Producer, Dean, Yale School of Drama, New Haven, Connecticut. George Schaefer Theater, Film and Television Director, Dean, UCLA’s Theater Arts, Film and Television Department, Los Angeles, California. Robert Stack Actor, Los Angeles, California. William L. Van Alen Architect, Wilmington, Delaware. James Wood Director, Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois. MEMBERS OF THE ADVISORY COMMITTEE Gordon M. Ambach Executive Director, Council of Chief State School Officers, Washington, D.C. Former New York Commissioner ol Education. Maya Angelou Author, actress, composer, Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Reynold Professor of American Studies, Wake Forest University. Christopher Van Antwerp Executive Director, Michigan Association ol Community Arts Agencies, Grand Rapids, Michigan. Leonard Bernstein Conductor, composer, former Music Director, New York Philharmonic, New York, New York. 42 James F. Boesen James F. Boesen Principal, Apple Valley High School, Apple Valiev. Minnesota. 1986 Kennedy Center Arts Alliance Awardee. Ernest L. Boyer President, Carnegie Foundation lor the Advancement ol leaching. Princeton, New Jersey. Former U. S. Conunissionei ol Education. J. Carter Brown Director, National Gallery ol Ar t, Washington. !).(.. Raymond W. Campeau Visual Arts Teacher, Bozeman High School, Bozeman, Montana. Recipient of 1987 Governor's Award of the Ai ls. Laura H. Chapman Consultant, author ol Instant Art , Instant Culture: The Unspoken Mn Far American Schools, Cincinnati, Ohio. Naney S. Cole Dean ol the College ol Education at the University ol Illinois at Urbana- Champaign, Illinois. President, American Educational Research Association (AERA). Brazeal W. Dennard Supervisor of Music in Detroit Public Schools. Director of the Brazeal Dennard Chorale, Detroit, Michigan. Stephen Donadio Chairman, Department ol American Literature and Civilization. Middlebury College. Middlebury, Vermont. Leilani Lattin Duke Director, The Getty Center tor Education in the Arts, Los Angeles. California. Elliot Eisner Professor of Education and Art, Author. Stanford University, Stanford. California. Frank Owen Cehry Architect, Venice, California. Worked with elementary school pro- grams, taught at \ale Architecture School and Harvard Graduate School of Design. Robert Glidden Dean. School of Music, Florida Stale University, lalahassee. Florida. President, National Association of Schools of Music. Kay H. Goodwin Arts education consultant, former Chairman. West Virginia Arts and Humanities Commission. Ripley, West Virginia. Sam W. Graharski Executive Director. Minnesota Stale Arts Board. St. Paul. Minnesota. 43 Harriet Keyserling Member of South Carolina House of Representatives and Chairman of Joint Legislative Committee on Cultural Affairs, Beaufort, South Carolina. Robert Lee Kidd 111 Music teacher, Eisenhower Elementary School. Norman, Oklahoma. Wayne Lawson Executive Director, Ohio Arts Council, Columbus, Ohio. Former Chairman, National Assembly of State Arts Agencies. Fred Lazarus IV President, The Maryland Institute, College of Art, Baltimore, Mary- land. Paul Lehman Professor ot Music Education and Associate Dean, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan. Former President, Music Educators National Conference. Stanley Madeja Dean, College of Visual and Performing Arts, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, Illinois. Bruee Marks Artistic Director, Boston Ballet, Boston. Massachusetts. Board Mem- ber. American Council lor the Arts. Judith F. Melillo Music teacher, Conant Elementary School, Acton, Massachusetts. President, Massachusetts Music Educators Association. Charles A. Qualley President, National Art Education Association and Area Coordinator for Art Education, Department of Fine Arts, University of Colorado- Boulder, Boulder, Colorado. Thomas A. Shannon Executive Director, National School Boards Association, Alexandria, Virginia. Barbara Salisbury Vi ills Associate Professor, Department of Drama, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas. Textbook author and President of American Association of Theatre lor Youth. 44 Excerpts from The National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act of 1965, as Amended (20 U.S.C. 951 et seq.) Sec. 10(c)(1) the Chairperson ul the National Kndovvmcnt loi tin Arts and the Chairperson ol the National endowment loi the Humanities, with the cooperation of the Sect clary ol education, shall conduct jointly a study of — (A) the state ol arts education and humanities education, as currently taught in the public elementary and secondary schools m the United Stales; and (B) the current and future availability of qualified instructional personnel, and other factors, affecting the quality of education in the aits and humanities in such schools. (2) l he endowments shall consult with the Committe e on Uaboi and Human Resources of the Senate and the Committee on Kduc alion and Laboi ol the House ol Representatives in the design and the implementation of the study required by this subsection. (3) Not later than two years aftei the dale ol the enactment ol the Arts, Humanities, and Museums Amendments ol 1985, the endow- ments shall submit to the- President, the Congress and the States a report containing (A) the findings ol tlu study undei paragraph (1); (R) the Endowments \ iews ot the i ole ol the arts and humanities in elemental y and secondary education; (C) recommendations designed to encouiage making arts and humanities education available thioughout elementary and sec - ondary schools: (D) recommendations loi the pai licipation by the National Endowment loi the Ails and the National Endowment loi the 1 Humanities in arts education and humanities education in such schools; and (E) an evaluation ol existing policies of the National Endowment loi the Aits and the National Endowment loi Humanities that expressly or inliei colly affect the Endowme nts abilitie s to expand such pai licipation. 45 The Committee commends the initiatives undertaken by both Endow- ments with respect to arts and humanities education and urges both Chairpersons of the Endowments to expand upon their efforts in these areas. The National Endowment for the Humanities’ support of seminars and institutes for high school and college teachers has made available at modest cost important regenerative training for thousands ol teachers. In addition, its effort to encourage colleges and universities to undertake curriculum reform, particularly of general education and degree requirements, and to emphasize the central disciplines of the humanities has had rapid and direct effects on many colleges and universities. The Committee encourages the Endowment for the Humanities to continue these efforts. Additionally, the Committee believes the issue ol the condition of arts and humanities education should receive particular study. The Committee believes that arts and humanities education is central to the stated purpose of this Act which includes encouraging national progress and scholarship in the humanities and the arts, making citizens masters of their technology, becoming a nation which is a leader in ideas and spirit, and bringing to all our citizens a better understanding of the past and a better view' of the future. The Committee also recognizes that arts and humanities education play an important role in cognitive learning and in making the arts and humanities less elitist and more available to all citizens. In Section 102 of the bill the Committee includes in the Preamble an elaboration of the role of the Endowments in arts and humanities education in the schools to enable students to recognize and appreciate the aesthetic dimensions of our lives, artistic and scholarly expression, and the diversity of excellence that comprises our cultural heritage. In Section 105 of the bill, the Committee further clarifies by adding a provision to section 5(c), that the National Endowment for the Arts is authorized to fund projects and productions that will encourage public knowledge, understanding and appreciation of the arts. The Committee incorporates this provision in section 5(c) to emphasize its belief that federal support for the arts should reflect a charge to NEA to fund activities and individuals for purposes which educate as well as entertain the public about the arts. The Committee believes that this addition to section 5(c) complements the other provisions in the section and strengthens the addition of the same theme to the Declaration of Purpose in the Act. encouraging arts education for the public in the broadest sense. The addition to section 5(c) should not be construed to lessen or alter the importance of the other respon- sibilities delineated in the section. F inally, in Section 110 of the bill, the Committee requires that the 46 Chairpersons of the National Endowments jointly, with the cooperation of the Secretary of Education, conduct a study of the state ol arts and humanities education, as currently taught in tlx 1 public elementary and secondary schools in the United Slates. The study must examine the current and future availability ol qualified instructional personnel and other factors affecting the quality of education in the arts and humanities in public elementary and secondary schools. The Endowments must consult with the Committee on Labor and Human Resources ol the Senate and the Committee on Education and Labor of the House ol Representatives on the design and implementation ol the study. Not later than two years alter the enactment ol this hill the Chairpersons of the Endowments must submit to the President, the Congress, and the Stales a report of the findings of this study, recommendations for encouraging arts and humanities education, and recommendations for expanding the participation of the Endowments in public elementary and secondary education. In addition, the study must assess the impact of the Endowments' policies on their participation in arts and humanities education. It must also assess whether any polices have positive or unintentional adverse effects on the Endowments’ abilities to expand their support for and participation in promoting arts and humanities education in the public elementary and secondary schools. Several excellent reports on arts in education in the schools by the Getty Foundation, the Chief State School Officers, the National Center for Education Statistics, the Endowments and others have been issued recently. It is the intent ol the Committee that the Endowments use the information and findings in these studies as a primary resource for their own assessment of arts and humanities education. 47 Bibliography Adler. M. 1082. The Paideia Proposal. New York. N.Y: Macmillan. Alliance for Arts Fducation. John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, and American Association of School Administrators. 1985. Performing Together: The Arts and Education. Washington, D.C.: American Association of School Administrators. Alliance for Al ls Fducation. John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. 1987. “State of the Arts: An Interchange Update.' Interchange Summer Issue. Washington. D.C.: Alliance for Arts Education, John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. American Association of Theatre for Youth, and American Association for Theatre in Secondary Education. 1987. A Model Drama /Theatre Curriculum. Philosophy. Coals and Objectives. New Orleans, La.: Anchorage Press. Arkansas Board of Education, n.d. Music. Arkansas Public School Course Content Guide. Little Rock, Ar.: Arkansas Board of Education. Arts. Fducation and Americans Panel. American Council for the Arts in Education. 1977. Coming to Our Senses: The Significance of the Arts for American Education. New York, N.Y.: McGraw Hill. Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. December 1987/January 1988. Educational Leadership 45. Alexandria, Va.: Association lor Supervision and Curriculum Development. Beethoven. J.: Dav idson. J.: Nadon-Gabrion, G.; Bavosa. C.; Weikart, P; and Bledsoe, D. 1988. World of Music. Teacher Edition. Grade 5. Morristown, N.J.: Silver, Burdett