Here we go again…
Every time there is tight money and schools are looking for a place to cut, it’s the arts that go on the chopping block.
Besides funding, schools are worried about attendance. This is not a change of subject.
For many kids with learning challenges, they are only coming to school for the arts portion of their day. In Maryland, children between 5 and 18 are required to attend school. If traditional school learning is a challenge for you, that means a life sentence of failure. Every day someone will demonstrate that you are not as smart (read not as good as) some of your peers. Yet you gotta go every day because that’s the law. So you figure out ways to avoid the daily punishment. You skip school whenever you can; you feign illness. For many children, the only reason to come to school, the only place where their other skills count, is the arts.
Instruction in visual arts, music and theatre always lags behind the “important” subjects of English, math, science and history/social studies. Reading on grade level is now the holy grail of education based on the new policy passed by the State Board of Ed and the new Superintendent.
The Blueprint for Maryland’s Future is very specific about how local districts can spend their money. Seventy-five percent of the State funds must go for the pillars in the Blueprint. That leaves the remaining 25% for everything else, including the arts. Advocates for the arts tried to get those areas included in the Blueprint along with other content areas. They failed. The arts are generally considered an added extra, the icing on the cake that can easily be done without. State regulations require instruction in the arts but there are no specifics as to how that requirement is met.
Maryland is facing a 3 billion dollar budget deficit so budget cutting is more likely than budget enhancement.
No district in Maryland gets more money from the Blueprint than Baltimore City because of its high concentration of students living in poverty. It can also be argued that no district in the state is in greater need of providing arts education to struggling learners and to kids whose families are unlikely able to supplement the school programs with cultural experiences. The City also has a HUGE attendance problem. The arts could help solve this problem. Frederick and Howard counties are both proposing to cut arts programming.
Give the kids a reason to come to school. Give them a space to shine and show their other abilities. Why is school just for the academically talented kids?
