Originally written for the Spring 2010 edition of Michigan Art Education Association's quarterly ArTeacher by William Charland, PhD

During the 2009 MAEA Conference, a group of concerned art educators, including representatives of college and university art education programs and K-12 art teachers, met to discuss an issue of vital importance to our students and our profession - the trend across Michigan's school districts to replace trained art educators with untrained teachers drawn from the ranks of general education.

Michigan's school districts cannot be faulted for developing strategies to stretch their budgets - we are all aware of the dire financial situation that cripples our state and threatens our schools. What is inexcusable is undercutting core programs, as defined by the U.S. Department of Education, to foist untrained generalists on unsuspecting children and parents.

While the effects of unqualified and mis-appointed personnel are most immediately felt by children in the art classroom, the trend has not gone unnoticed more widely. It's likely that every K-12 art teacher across the state knows of an instance. Many of our members have been personally affected. The MAEA stands squarely against this practice, and continues to represent us when related policy issues are discussed in Lansing. The Michigan Youth Arts Leadership Roundtable, a coalition of 17 arts education organizations in consultation with the Michigan Council for Arts and Cultural Affairs and the Michigan Department of Education, also recognizes this practice as being detrimental to arts education across the board, and in their 2010 Policy Agenda states the importance of qualified arts specialists in K-12 schools. "To ensure high quality learning experiences in the arts for all students, it is important for them to have instruction that is delivered by a Highly Qualified educator in that content area."

The implications for art teacher training programs in higher education are obvious - when there is no longer a need for trained, certified and properly endorsed professionals in the art classroom, there is no longer a need for college and university art education programs. And while our immediate influence on district decision-makers may be limited, we do have the power to get their attention.

I urge my higher-education colleagues to consider the following plans of action:

To extend this final point to its logical conclusion, higher education institutions can and should refuse to place interns not just in schools, but in entire districts, that supplant qualified art teachers with unqualified stand-ins. In doing so, we retain our professional self-respect, and reconfirm the value of art education to our children and the future of our state and nation. Talk to your institution's placement officers, and insist that they do the right thing.