I was just reading an article about music and arts education in elementary and middle schools. And it was not a positive one. I have read quite a bit and studied what is basically the decline of quality arts and arts education in the United States. As more and more schools are forced to make budget cuts more and more arts programs are seeing themselves fold. This is because we have become a society so obsessed with standardized testing, which only focuses on three subjects, that it has been deemed that arts education is unnecessary. This is a crazy idea to me as studies have been done proving that children, especially those in music, have much higher reading comprehension skills and critical thinking skills as they are essentially learning a different language. Arts classes improve creativity and can actually improve situational awareness.
It is sad to see that these courses are not deemed important or necessary anymore. Even if you do not believe these classes hold any real educational value they simply define our culture. Art, music, and food are three of the largest things that define a group of people and what their values are. By taking away the remaining two from schools, as cooking classes and home ec have basically become obsolete in schools we are going to see a massive decline in the quality. Hopefully people will realize this and help the fight to save our arts programs in schools.
I find it paradoxical that the state of primary and secondary education in the United States is as appalling as it is, but America's colleges and universities are still the envy of the world. It makes one wonder if much of that higher education is simply meant for the rest of the world. I know that here in Arizona, Governor Doug Ducey and Superintendent of Public Instruction Diane Douglas have disagreed sharply over the state's funding of public education. While I try not to take sides in political disputes between politicians, I support Superintendent Douglas on the issue of school funding.
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