Arts Education Newsletter
Issue No. 7 A publication of the Michigan Youth Arts Leadership Roundtable January 2010
In this issue
Kendall Student wins national Award
Sara Sciba promotes art education

ArtServe Music Scholarships
National Symphony Orchestra Summer Music Institute for young adults
Data Collection in Arts Ed
CCSSO endorsement


MCACA Minigrants
Regional organizations and schools can benefit

News and Opportunities
VSA Institute, Claiming Creativity in Chicago, MDE conference, Japan fellowship, AEP in D.C.
MYA
Michigan Youth Arts logo Sara Sciba wins 2010 NAEA Higher Education Student Achievement Award

Sara ScibaThe National Art Education Association bestows one award annually to recognize excellence in student achievement at the college university level.  This year's award goes to Sara Sciba, a senior at Kendall College of Art and Design. 

Sarah is a talented visual artist. Her work is often displayed on Kendall's walls as an example of excellence. For the past three years she has donated artwork to the Grand Rapids Public Schools' fundraiser, Arts Jam, helping to raise thousands of dollars for their arts programming.
 
Sarah consistently demonstrates leadership. She has served as the Michigan Arts Education Association Student Chapter President and Secretary and on the state level she has served as the Co-Student Representative on the MAEA Council for the past 2 years. Last year she presented at the MAEA conference, How to Start a Student Chapter. After being inspired during the NAEA conference, she has worked hard to improve Kendall's Student Chapter to the point of excellence.

The Kendall administration has also recognized Sarah's leadership capabilities, asking her to represent the student perspective on their long-term strategic planning committee's Student Life Focus Group. She was also invited to be a part of the hiring committee for the Director of Student Activities candidates.
ArtserveiconDeadline to Apply for National Symphony Orchestra Summer Music Institute - January 22nd
 
Calling all serious music students! Don't miss the opportunity to apply for the Kennedy Center/National Symphony Orchestra Summer Music Institute. This is a four-week summer music program at the John F. Kennedy Center for the performing Arts in Washington, DC, for student instrumentalists.

Each year, through an initiative of the NSO National Trustees, ArtServe Michigan recommends up to five young Michigan musicians for a National Trustees' fellowship. The program is open, by application including a recorded audition, to high school students, as well as college freshmen and sophomores, seriously considering orchestral music as a career and willing to devote themselves to a musical education. Applications are evaluated by a team of professional musicians and music education professionals and the top five applicants are forwarded for further consideration at the national level.

Deadline for Applications: Materials must be submitted to ArtServe Michigan, 1 Clover Court, Wixom, MI 48393 by Friday, January 22, 2010 at 5:00 pm EDT. Students will be notified of the results by mid-March 2010.

The fellowship provides the following benefits to students accepted into the program:

·Round-trip air transportation to and from Washington, DC
·Housing, meals, and local transportation, during the program
·Private lessons taught by a member of the National Symphony Orchestra
·Chamber music coaching by NSO musicians
·Master classes and seminar
·Attendance at selected rehearsals and performances of the NSO
·Participation in the NSO Summer Music Institute Orchestra
·Performance opportunities in DC metropolitan area
·Exposure to internationally-renowned conductors, soloists, and musicians

For additional information and details on how to apply for the program please visit artservemichigan.org.
iconMDECCSSO Endorses Data Collection in the Arts and Other ESEA Core Academic Areas

"The Council is vitally interested in promoting a full and balanced
curriculum for all students. Collecting data on all curricular areas
s the only way to make this balance transparent."                                   

Gene Wilhoit, Executive Director, Council of Chief State School Officers

Educators can testify to the system's renewed emphasis on data-driven decision-making. The conversations are not only about summative data, i.e. data that lets us know how successful teaching and learning has been, but also about formative data, i.e. data that lets us know how we're doing as we're doing it so that we can adjust and improve instruction, as well as opportunities to learn data.

Summative data is like a Mapquest that lets us know if we got from point A to point B. Formative data is more like the gauges on our automobile that we can monitor and adjust as we drive between points A and B to ensure we get there safely, without destroying the engine, and with enough gas. Opportunities to learn data lets us know who was in the car, who was running behind it, and who was still at home.

In the arts, we have suffered from a scarcity of easily accessible and reliable data. We have had only two limited arts NAEP (National Assessment of Educational Progress) tests that tell us what a small national sampling of 8th grade students know and can do in only the visual arts and music. There is currently no MEAP or Michigan Merit Exam to measure student success in the arts. Most districts have not yet developed common summative and interim assessments for the Michigan Merit Curriculum's 1-credit arts requirement and Michigan does not currently gather data on arts course offerings and participation. At this point in time, it is difficult for educators and administrators in Michigan to collectively understand how many students are participating in arts education classes and what those classes are, how well students performing in these classes, and what might be done to improve student success in these courses.

On December 10, 2009, the State Education Agency Directors of Arts Education (SEADAE), the professional organization of my peers across the country, issued a press release announcing the following Council of Chief State School Officers endorsement:

"Chiefs should encourage data collections of school courses, teachers, and numbers of students enrolled. Collections should include the core academic subjects as defined by ESEA as well as physical education, health, and career technology education." (ESEA defines core academic subjects as English, reading or language arts, mathematics, science, foreign languages, civics and government, economics, arts, history and geography.)

This recommendation from the professional organization of superintendents of state departments of education to its members is a key victory in broadening conversations at the national and local levels from a limited focus on only English Language Arts and mathematics to one that includes all ESEA core academic areas. It was an effort led by the arts educators that comprise SEADAE but it is one that advocated for inclusion of other content areas also suffering from a lack of statewide data. The CCSSO recommendation is critical as states further develop the longitudinal data systems that will inform education policy for the coming decades.

In the SEADAE press release Sue Gendron, Commissioner of Education (Maine) and CCSSO President, stated, "As we move ahead with our unprecedented effort to collect important and comparable data from all states, it is critical that we have a complete picture of the range and depth of the curriculum around the country. This includes the curricular areas that are tested as well as those that are not."

Jerry Zahorchak, CCSSO Liaison to EIMAC and Pennsylvania's Commissioner of Education, noted "When state data on classes, teachers, and students are collected, we must have a complete and accurate picture of what courses are being offered, who is teaching them, and how many students are receiving the instruction."

Ana Luisa Cardona
Education Consultant
Arts Infused Education and Innovation
Michigan Department of Education
cardonaa@michigan.gov
iconMCACAMCACA's 2010 Programs Reflect Historically Low Funding

The Michigan Council for Arts and Cultural Affairs has approved programs for FY 2010 that reflects the greatly reduced revenue appropriated for grants, address the needs of the state's arts and cultural organizations, regardless of geography, in a fair and equitable way and still offer Michigan's citizens some access to high quality arts and cultural projects, programs and educational opportunities.

The following are two programs that may be of particular interest to educators. Additional programs will be announced mid-January, check out our new website for updates and more: www.themedc.org/arts.

Regional Regranting Minigrant Program - grants of up to $4,000 for nonprofit organizations, schools and municipalities for high quality arts and cultural projects. Applications and assistance are available through one of 19 regional regranting agencies located throughout Michigan.  This list of regranting organizations and contact information is available on MCACA's website. Applications for mini grants will not be available until after January 18, 2010; the deadline to apply is February 24, 2010.

School Bus Fast Grants - grants of up to $500 per K-12 school building for the documented transportation cost of a field trip to designated MCACA-affiliated arts and culture organizations. The deadline to apply is February 8, 2010. Guidelines, applications and the list of organizations are on MCACA's website.

The Michigan Council for Arts and Cultural Affairs also supports special projects and initiatives:
  • The National Endowment for the Arts' Poetry Out Loud Program and the Michigan Touring Arts Program managed by the Michigan Humanities Council (www.michiganhumanities.org).
  • The New Leaders Art Council of Michigan is MCACA's youth advisory council and will offer a grant program in 2010 just for youth projects (www.themedc.org/arts).
  • MCACA partners with Arts Midwest (www.artsmidwest.org), who offers grant assistance and brings national and international touring artists to Michigan, among a host of other programs.
For more information, contact Carolyn Damstra, Program Manager: damstrac@michigan.org (please note new email address).
NewsNews and Opportunities

VSA arts Institute, February 25-27
The VSA arts Institute is a series of professional development workshops that focus on designing and delivering arts learning experiences that reach students with disabilities. Through discussion and hands-on arts activities, participants gain an understanding of the foundations of arts learning and inclusive education, and how to use inclusive practices in their work.  Learn more and register at vsami.org.

Jan. 22nd RFP Deadline for MDE-NCA School Improvement Conference
Share your arts education strategies with others statewide. "Effective School Improvement Practices" will take place in Lansing, March 15-16.  Presentations should emphasize hands-on, practical information that is directly related to improving student achievement.  National speakers will be featured, along with selected outstanding concurrent sessions conducted by practitioners and featuring what works in schools. For more information and to submit a proposal email Ana Luisa Cardona at cardonaa@michigan.gov.

Claiming Creativity symposium in Chicago, April 21-24
The symposium Claiming Creativity will take place at Columbia College Chicago. The audience will be composed of practitioners and policymakers from all over the world. Claiming Creativity will offer presenters and other participants a practical forum for the investigation of long-standing and emerging issues in the arts and arts related fields. Through workshops, roundtable discussions and selected presentations from leading experts on creativity in the arts, commerce, science and industry, participants will share research, develop works in progress, and share their findings through a web forum and a symposium "journal," published through one of Columbia College Chicago's academic presses.  Visit Claiming Creativity for more information.

Deadline for the U.S./Japan Creative Artists' Program: February 1, 2010
Eligible applicants are architects, choreographers, composers, creative writers, designers, media artists, playwrights, visual artists, or solo theater artists who work with original material (including puppeteers, storytellers and performance artists). Multidisciplinary artists and artistic directors of theater or dance companies are also eligible.  The Japan-U.S. Friendship Commission works cooperatively with the National  Endowment for the Arts to sponsor The U.S/Japan Creative Artists' Program.  The program provides support for up to five outstanding contemporary and traditional artists from the United States to spend a five-month residency in Japan to pursue their
individual artistic goals.  Click here for details.

Registration opens January 11 for AEP's Spring 2010 National Forum in D.C.
Arts Education Partnership's conference focuses on new leadership not just at the federal level, but also in how it relates to arts and education leaders of the next generation, and the new ideas and concepts that will help bring us to the next stage in making the arts a real and cohesive part of every child's education.  Invited speakers include: Arne Duncan, U.S. Secretary of Education; Rocco Landesman, Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts.  April 9-10.  To learn more and register, click here.