In Practice: School-Based Arts Education
From the start, we knew that increasing students’ access to the arts would need to be led by our heroes -- educators, artists, and advocates.
Schools and school districts play an essential role in ensuring that young people grow up with the arts. But changing public education so that ALL schools provide arts instruction for ALL students is a tall order. With this goal, the LA County Board of Supervisors launched the Arts Education Collective in 2002 with just five school district partners. Today, the Arts Ed Collective includes 74 of LA County’s 81 school districts, plus five charter school networks, each working to expand arts learning for students in all of their schools. Yet, the work is not done.
The Arts Ed Collective operates as a collective impact initiative, which means that many partners come together to make greater change than any single entity can accomplish alone. Our school districts are supported by the LA County Office of Education, nonprofit arts organizations, and teaching artists who work in classrooms.
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- Coaching to create strategic plans that increase arts instruction in their schools
- Matching grants to launch specific action items identified in their strategic plan
- Professional development for teachers to include the arts in their classroom
- Networking with other school districts and community arts partners to share promising practices and strategies for advancing arts education in their schools
Each year, school districts come together as part of the Arts Ed Collective to identify concrete actions that will advance arts education in their schools. These collaborative efforts move us toward realizing Goal 1 of LA County’s New Regional Blueprint for Arts Education.
As we prepare to usher in the 20th Anniversary of the Arts Education Collective, we want to take a moment to reflect on how far we’ve come and to celebrate our progress. Through the work of literally hundreds of collaborating partners and allies, school-based arts education continues to grow throughout our region.
We never could have accomplished so much without champions like YOU!
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School-Based Arts Education Matters
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Last spring, KCET released a special Arts Education episode of their acclaimed Artbound documentary series. Commissioned by the Arts Ed Collective Funders Council and developed in collaboration with the LA County Department of Arts and Culture, Artbound: Arts Education makes the case for why arts education is so important for our young people. Anne Bown-Crawford, Director of the California Arts Council, explains how the arts help to cultivate healthy and resilient school communities. Kristin Sakoda, Director of the LA County Department of Arts and Culture, echoes the benefits of arts education and points out their value for young people, within and beyond the classroom.
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Our Partners Bring Learning to Life
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The LA County Office of Education has been a key partner in the Arts Education Collective since the beginning, and together we’re taking great strides towards ensuring arts instruction is provided for all students in all of our schools. Over the past 8 years, the Office of Education has been working in partnership with the Department of Arts and Culture to develop and implement Technology Enhanced Arts Learning (TEAL). This online and in-person professional development for K-6 teachers helps them deliver culturally relevant, integrated arts instruction, which also centers on social emotional learning, for all students. To date, TEAL has served:
- 8,450 educators
- 50 school districts
- 42 independent charter schools
- 17 private schools across LA County
Tune in below to learn more:
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Day in and day out, LA County teachers encourage students to embrace their creativity, build practical life skills, and develop confidence through the arts. There are so many different ways this is taking shape. We could not be more proud to be in service to, and working in partnership with, our school district partners. Check out some of their accomplishments below:
- Acton-Agua Dulce Unified School Board members are supporting their staff in developing their first strategic plan for arts education and pushing to center the needs of historically excluded students.
- Lynwood Unified teachers are using what they learned at LACMA Evenings for Educators to teach narrative portraiture (storytelling through portraits) to their third grade students, and then share these lessons with teachers from across the district.
- Elementary teachers in Hacienda La Puente Unified are discovering new ways to integrate media arts into their curriculum using graphic design tools recently added to classroom iPads.
- All middle schoolers in Culver City Unified receive dance instruction during their PE class. Teaching artists from Lula Washington Dance Theater, On the Edge Dance Studio and Viver Brasil Dance Company share culture and creativity through African dance, hip-hop, and Afro-Brazilian dance.
- Baldwin Park Unified elementary students in need of additional support during the school day can visit the wellness room on campus that is guided by staff with backgrounds in the arts and art therapy.
- In a new CTE pathway, Inglewood Unified School District students are learning music industry and audio production fundamentals with 1500 Sound Academy instructors and Grammy award winning producers.
- At Rose City Continuation School in Pasadena Unified, students, teachers, security guards, front office staff, and the principal are engaging in arts-based healing-centered workshops and professional development led by the Arts for Healing and Justice Network members Fostering Dreams Project, Street Poets, and artworxLA, to nurture school community wellbeing.
- Whittier City School District is adapting to their substitute teacher shortage by uplifting innovative TEAL resources in weekly newsletters for teachers. These newsletters provide "check ins, a little self-care, and a dash of hope," and are chock full of arts resources that support social emotional learning, inspire arts-integrated lessons, and offer words of encouragement for teachers during these challenging times.
- School Counselors from across Mountain View Elementary School District meet monthly with LACOE’s TEAL leaders to design arts activities that foster social emotional learning.
- Educators representing every school in Saugus Union School District are working together to create a district-wide afterschool curriculum that honors and celebrates a different culture each month.
- Pomona Unified is offering workshops facilitated by Arts for Healing and Justice Network member Tia Chucha’s Centro Cultural to parents and caregivers to support their own self-care, as well as the wellbeing/resilience of their children.
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Is your school offering these kinds of opportunities for our students, teachers and parents? Help us ensure all young people have access to school-based arts education.
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