Jeff Rogers, supervisor of Carroll County Public Schools fine arts department, stands in front of student artwork.
Written By David Greisman, Photos by: Phil Grout
At one point in the history of U. S. public education, students went from focusing on “the three Rs” of reading, writing and arithmetic to an additional emphasis on “STEM” subjects: science, technology, engineering and mathematics skills. All the while, the arts remained a constant presence in children’s education.
There are signs that the inclusion of the arts in school curricula is becoming less common.
Classes and programs involving art, dance, drama and music are increasingly endangered, put on the chopping block as school systems nationwide confront tight budgets and look to make significant cuts.
“Arts and music are always up toward the top of the list to be cut,” said Randy Cohen, vice president of research and policy for Americans for the Arts, a national organization working to ensure that every American has access to the arts and a quality arts education.
“Cuts need to be proportional,” said Cohen. “We understand that these are tight budget times, and it would be unrealistic to say ÔLeave the arts alone’ and cut the other stuff instead.
“What we see, however, are disproportionate cuts — cutting all the music and arts teachers in order to preserve the other things in total. I would say that is providing a disservice to the students.”
Fortunately in Carroll County, although the public school system also has needed to make budget cuts in recent years, arts administrators here say their programs have not been gutted.
“I’m thankful for the Board of Education and the superintendent that we have; at no time are they looking to target the arts with budget cuts,” said Jeff Rogers, Carroll’s supervisor of fine arts. “I will say that the arts, like everything else, are getting squeezed as budgets get tighter and tighter.”
Meanwhile, students in middle and high school have less flexibility to fit in classes in the arts, thanks in part to the need to take other topics now being mandated under state education regulations.
“There’s only so much time in the day,” said Cristina Gruss, the school system’s assistant supervisor of fine arts.
That sometimes means choosing between, say, a foreign language course or a fine arts class.
“So what happens” said Rogers, “is that sometimes kids have to make choices. They take one of the arts, whereas in the past they got both art and music. Sometimes that’s not happening, and that’s troublesome to me, because I don’t think kids have found their voices yet by 6th grade.”
At the high school level, students must have one fine arts credit in order to graduate. They can take additional arts courses as electives. But the budget cuts mean fewer faculty, which can means fewer offerings of a class during the day. When two different courses are being offered on the same day at the same time, that can lead to arts classes losing out in favor of other requirements being fulfilled.
“They can fit the arts,” said Rogers. “How many of the arts they can fit is the question.”
But Carroll County’s student arts scene remains strong, according to Rogers and Gruss.
“With all the challenges that we’ve talked about,” said Gruss, “and all the barriers that we have to overcome on a daily basis, we still have such a community presence — not only with drama, but with band and choral performances and our visual arts exhibits.”
Rogers and Gruss proudly described the sizable crowds that came to see kids’ artwork on display at Carroll Community College and the Carroll Arts Center; the accomplishments of student musicians at a solo and ensemble festival; the fact that there are about 80 nights a year in which a student drama production is staged, and the recognition that specific schools have received for providing kids with an outstanding arts education.
Children can and do benefit from access to the arts, said Americans for the Arts’ Cohen, who cited research that showed students with more access to the arts performed better academically, had lower dropout rates, were more likely to complete college and were more engaged with the community.
But the biggest decreases in arts education are in low-income and Title I schools, Cohen said. “Where we see the arts cuts happening most right now is with the kids who stand to benefit the most.”
Cohen’s organization continues to advocate for the arts, bolstered in part by business leaders who value creativity along with the skills imparted through science, technology, engineering and math classes. That turns STEM into STEAM, Cohen said.
“Every child deserves a quality education that includes arts and music,” he said. “Some kids are getting it in this country, and the research would suggest their future is going to look brighter. It’s important that every child has access to it. It comes down to America’s economic competitiveness.”
For children — whether they are experiencing the arts as audience members or as active participants — that involvement can be critical to their neuropsychological development, according to Henry Reiff of McDaniel College, who is finishing up his final semester as a dean this June and is returning to the classroom there as a professor of education.
“It involves parts of the brain that other kinds of experiences do not necessarily involve, which I think is tremendously important,” Reiff said.
Reiff has worked with students who have special needs for more than three decades. He described a glee club he began at one school:
“They sang and laughed and shouted and stomped,” he said. “They were celebrating all the parts of themselves that had nothing to do with their learning disabilities.”
Arts also are an integral place for students to learn problem-solving skills, to find their voice and perhaps their passion, said Carroll arts supervisor Rogers.
He was once told that other academic areas are the meat and potatoes in a child’s education.
“That’s right,” said Rogers, “but we need to feed our children more than meat and potatoes. If the arts are the vegetables, then we need to make sure they’re getting a well-rounded meal, a well-rounded education.”
