Kristen Engebretsen

Welcome to Youth Arts Month

Posted by Kristen Engebretsen, Mar 01, 2013 4 comments


Kristen Engebretsen

Kristen Engebretsen Kristen Engebretsen

March 1 kicks off a month-long celebration of youth participation and learning in the arts. Many states, cities, and organizations have their own way of celebrating.

Here is just a random sampling of ideas I’ve seen from around the web:

1. National Young Audiences Arts for Learning Week, March 24–30

2. March is Music In Our Schools Month

3. Youth Art Month

4. March for the Arts in Education Month: Empowering Youth through the Arts

5. Theatre in Our Schools Month

At Americans for the Arts, we’ll be hosting a Blog Salon about early childhood education later this month (March 18–22), but for today’s kickoff of Youth Arts Month, we wanted to share something special.

Today we are releasing the first part of a new Arts Education Navigator series of e-books designed to help educators, students, and advocates navigate the complex field of arts education.

Part of our partnership with Vans Custom Culture, each e-book in the series will cover a specific topic, ensuring arts education supporters like you are equipped with the knowledge, statistics, and case-making techniques needed to effectively communicate with decision-makers. 

Our new e-book series kicks off with Facts & Figures. Our new e-book series kicks off with Facts & Figures.

The first e-book in the series, Facts & Figures, provides you with all of the data you need to convince someone of the benefits of arts education, as well as the urgent need to prevent the decline of arts education.

Facts & Figures draws on classic arts education research such as Champions of Change, as well as new reports like Arts Education in America: What the Declines Mean for Arts Participation.

Presented in an easy-to-read format, this e-book highlights key data points every advocate needs when discussing the importance of arts education.

I hope that during this month you will use Facts & Figures, particularly as March is often the month when school boards hold hearings to make budget decisions for next year. (For more about that, check out a blog Joshua Miller wrote last March about resources for school board advocacy.)

The five e-books in the Navigator series will roll out during 2013, in both English and Spanish. We’ll be sure to update everyone often with new additions!

Happy reading and Happy Youth Arts Month!

4 responses for Welcome to Youth Arts Month

Comments

Margaret Holt says
March 04, 2013 at 10:15 pm

May I share another link with you??? ArtBreak is the largest children's art festival in the south - maybe the country! Please check it out!!! http://shrevearts.org/education/artbreak/

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March 05, 2013 at 4:43 pm

THANK YOU for this fantastic resource! Powerful stats and quotes with beautiful graphics to boot! This is something we can all utilize in our quest to advance arts education.

As for warm and fuzzy anecdote + hard hitting data = effective messaging (keeping things personal, we love it), check out:

www.iamurbangateways.org

For up-close-and-personal encounters with arts education in Chicago

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Kristen Engebretsen says
March 08, 2013 at 1:25 pm

Thanks for sharing this website, Anna! I love the student testimonials. In our advocacy work, we need to find ways to 1) be more artistic in our approach and communications; and 2) utilize students' voices and artwork in our messages. This is so powerful! Thanks again for sharing!

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Kristen Engebretsen says
March 04, 2013 at 10:51 am

While the facts and figures in this e-book tell an important story about our field, they need to be told along with YOUR story. For a great article about this, check out Carter Gillies' blog: http://cartergilliespottery.wordpress.com/2013/03/02/a-copernican-revolu...

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