 |
 |
 |
Colorado Alliance for Arts Education
|
 |
Get Informed:
|
Use the information here to become better informed about the power of the arts. Remember, we are all born imaginative, curious, creative, but these qualities can fade with the passage of time, and are not typically fostered in the traditional school environment.
Education policy and reform is possible only through the thoughtful and sustained participation parents and the greater community, including businesses. By educating ourselves and working together, we can create the types of schools that nurture the individual child and foster creative/critical thinking.
|
Did You Know:
|
Through the Colorado Alliance for Arts Education's Schools of Excellence program, more schools in Colorado have been recognized as National Schools of Distinction than in any other state (we're tied with California).
To date, the Alliance has trained over 300 teachers across Colorado, providing them with strategies to reinforce arts discipline instruction, and connect the arts to literacy, math, and science.
The SCFD is a seven county district that collects one cent for ever $10 sale. In 2001, the SCFD granted $37 million dollars to 300 cultural institutions. In comparison, the National Endowment of the Arts grants to all 50 states totaled $115 million.
|
Food for Thought:
|
A piece of art can be viewed much like a text. It can demonstrate a period in history, a complex idelogogy, a specific philosophy, etc. Watching Martha Graham dance can be invaluable to understanding deconstructionist theory and postmodernism. Looking at an art piece representing thousands of pills can provide a starting point for dialogue among students of medical ethics. The arts can provide a reference, much like a text, to academic centered dialogues and pursuits.
Creativity is fashionably conceived as the engine for innovation and new ideas, but just as important is artistic creativity's links to emotions and feelings; artistic creativity is as much about AFFECT as it is about COGNITION. Economics is beginning to recognize the importance of emotions, affective resonance and emotional 'intelligence' as an economic resource.
All of the skills realized through ongoing learning through and participation in the arts will help America's workforce remain competitive in an increasingly knowledge-based and global economy.
Creative thinking that results in problem solving can be fostered through education in the arts, and understanding of international, national and regional cultures can be fostered through education in the humanities.
The arts, cultural, and intellectual property sectors of the U.S. and other economies are enormous and growing at rates faster than the economies as a whole.
There is research (Howard Gardner's work on multiple intelligences at Harvard University) that shows that education in the arts has the capacity to provide additional pathways or avenues for student achievement. Subsequent studies show that many students who have difficulty learning through traditional methods can benefit from teaching strategies that include other means of learning and subject areas, such as the arts.
There is also research (Shirley Brice Heath's work on ArtShow at Stanford University) demonstrating that young people enrolled in sports/academic, community service, and arts programs do better in school and in their personal lives than young people from similar socio-economic backgrounds not in such programs. Heath's research indicates that those enrolled in arts programs did the best.
Other nations are forging education and workforce policies based on these conclusions. British Prime Minister Tony Blair has described the UK's coordinated education and employment policy aim as forging "a nation where the creative talents of all people are used to build a true enterprise economy for the 21st century - where we compete on brains, not brawn." The report concluded that creative and cultural education are not merely curricular subjects, but subjects worthy of integration into the overall educational system.
|
|
- Rise of the Creative Class - Richard Florida
- Cultural Creatives - Sherry Ruth Anderson
- The Creative City: A Toolkit for Urban Innovators - Charles Landry
- The Substance of Style: How the Rise of Aesthetic Value Is Remaking Commerce, Culture, and Consciousness - Virginia Postrel
- Frames of Mind: The Theory of Multiple Intelligences - Howard Gardner
- Intelligence Reframed: Multiple Intelligences for the 21st Century - Howard Gardner
- Creators on Creating: Awakening and Cultivating the Imaginative Mind - by Frank X. Barron, Alfonso Montuori, Anthea Barron
|
| Recommended Websites: |
|
|
|
|
