California Assembly votes to further dilute arts as a high school requirement

 
California arts advocates suffered their third and worst legislative shutout in less than two months Wednesday as the Assembly voted 76 to 0 in favor of a bill that would allow more students to skip arts instruction entirely during their high school years.

To earn a diploma now, students have to take at least one yearlong course in arts or a foreign language. If the bill, AB 2446, passes the state Senate and is signed into law by the governor, students, starting in the 2011-12 school year, will be able to substitute a “career technical education” course for arts or a language. The bill has a "sunset" provision, meaning the change would be temporary, staying in effect for five academic years before expiring in mid-2016.

Its author, Warren Furutani (D-Gardena) says in a statement on his website that “the intent … is to increase high school graduation rates, which is an ever-pressing issue.”

By allowing students to take a technical course rather than arts or a language, backers say, teens aiming for immediate full-time jobs rather than college will be better prepared for them. Meanwhile, they say, being able to use a technical course to graduate, rather than arts or a language, could prompt some potential dropouts to stay and earn a diploma.

Laurie Schell, executive director of the California Alliance for Arts Education, said Wednesday that her group’s so-far fruitless lobbying will continue with state senators. In April, the Assembly Education Committee voted for Furutani’s bill, 8 to 0, and last week the Appropriations Committee approved it, 17 to 0.

Furutani launched his political career in 1987, when he became the first Asian American elected to the Los Angeles Unified School District board, where he served until 1996.

Part of the effort against the change, Schell said, will be to present data showing that “there’s a tremendous overlap” in skills learned in arts classes and those required for technical fields that students not on a college track might enter.

Students applying to the University of California or the Cal State systems are required to have at least a year of high school arts. Schell said that local school districts have the authority to set graduation standards that are higher than the statewide minimum requirement Furutani’s bill would change, and the Los Angeles Unified School District is among those that make a year of visual or performing arts mandatory.

When Furutani proposed a similar bill last year, it died in the Appropriations Committee. However, it was friendlier to arts education and foreign language instruction than the one now moving through the Legislature. Instead of being able to substitute technical training for arts or a language, last year’s bill called for making graduation requirements more stringent for all students. Instead of opting for arts or a foreign language, students could add technical education to the mix – but they would have to take a course in at least two of the three categories.

-- Mike Boehm

Poll: Should high school students skip all art and foreign language classes?

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Photo: The California Capitol. Credit: Wally Skali / Los Angeles Times

Comments

[Chris L]

Mr. Furitani, I think it is disgraceful to introduce a bill that will cut back on art being offered in schools. Art should be a requirement. Young people need art and the humanities. We need to be taking care of future minds, not limiting their exoeriences. If you don't nurture and stimulate imagination, there will be no invention or creation. We need imagination and creativity to help create jobs, not better grades. WAKE UP.

[grandma cranky pants]

Stupid. I guess a lack of critical thinking skills is exactly what we want for the future generations.

[busytimmy]

What's happening to the Golden State! This is outrageous!

[Robin Russin]

This is what happens when the humanities are considered "enhancements" instead of essentials. Every civilized society since the ancient Greeks recognized that education in the arts was of paramount importance to the well-being of the people and the state. Somehow, increasingly in this country, this has been forgotten.

This is a disgrace, plain and simple. Mr. Furitani, please move to Texas, where your views are more in line with their benighted policies. And to those who voted for him, thumb a ride, too.

[anon]

“Part of the effort against the change, Schell said, will be to present data showing that ‘there’s a tremendous overlap’ in skills learned in arts classes and those required for technical fields that students not on a college track might enter.”

Exactly. So since there is an overlap, wouldn't students who are facing a competitive job market when they graduate be better served by taking a job technical course that would actually benefit them? Absolutely.

I am an artist and have substituted in art classes in high schools -- honestly, they are kind of dumb. I am all for serious art training in high school for serious prospective artists but forcing kids to do art at that age is a waste of their time. And they know it.

There are many different kinds of creativity and schools should be encouraged to help students find their own avenue for creative expression. For many people that means having a useful job skill.

[Christopher Knight]

Richard Kessler, executive director at New York's Center for Arts Education, has condemned the California Assembly vote as establishing "a de facto caste system, whereby only those on a pathway to college are required to take the arts. Those who may go on to a vocation, well, they don't need the arts do they? As the son of a stagehand and a secretary, I find that offensive."

After dismantling the "improved graduation rate" claim, he calls for the governor to veto the plan.

http://bit.ly/bOIvAL

[Try this]

They just want robots, haven't you figured that yet out? History, arts and music, are gone. All generate creative problem solving skills.

[ArtEdNYC]

This is really disappointing and disgraceful. In a contemporary age where artistic, inventive and creative skills are becoming more and more necessary, it blows my mind that California would want to do a disservice to the next generation of citizens by cutting arts programs. It has been proven that children and adolescents who have experience with art growing up can become more well-rounded and can develop critical thinking and problem solving skills that can be applied in a vast amount of careers and areas of study. Arts are one of the only areas where students are given to opportunity to find the answer on their own, and where there is no one right answer; there are multiple perspectives and multiple ways of thinking to find an answer. So think again, California.

[william wray]

My art classes weren't the best, but they allowed me to get thru High School. I'd have dropped out without my A's in art. Art was the one class where I was motivated. The problem with this bill is it's another step in eliminating art entirely under the guise of more choice for the car mechanic oriented student. If they need more technical stuff to inspire staying in school, let there be a summer school program for it.

[Donald Frazell]

Perhaps if artistes hadnt distanced themselves from the rest of humanity this wouldnt have happened. Perhaps a case of the crows coming home to roost.
Now cutting history is a sin, we are doing the same damn mistakes over and over in our grandiose views of ourselves. And made Fox News a source of real information, started in the 70s with Eye Witless News. Art becoming useless in the eyes of the masses is because of its elitist and narcissistic nature. Imperial Clothing doesnt endear itself to those who work for a living.

art collegia delenda est

[D Willis]

Now for the other side of the story. A slightly more accurate, less biased title for this piece could have been "California Assembly votes to ensure kids stay in school long enough to graduate by keeping them engaged", or "California Assembly votes to prepare the State's future highly-skilled workforce", or, maybe even: "California Assembly votes to minimize inequalities in the current educational model." For those of you who commented and are obviously NOT in the k-12 system, here's a little reality check: ALL students are pushed into completing the A-G requirements, which include multiple years of foreign language classes and at least one year of art. CTE classes have been dumped on for the last 30 years at the expense of putting everybody in the "college track." The wood shop, graphics, home economics, drafting, and metals classes YOU probably took as a student that made you into the well-rounded individual you are today are no longer even an option for students in most places. And what has been the wonderful result? A 30%+ dropout rate. Research shows that true CTE engages students, keeps them in school until graduation, and gives them a much higher chance of actually entering post-secondary education and completing a program there than their "academics only" peers. This bill does not "cut back on art being offered in schools," it simply gives students the opportunity to get engaged in some relevant learning. Art educators need to stop turning this into a "turf war" and play fair. Our economy is in the dumps, unemployment is at an all time high, and yet there are thousands of high-skill, high-wage jobs that are unfilled becuase one day not long ago someone decided that finger-painting and making clay ashtrays was more prestigious than the "manual arts." My friends with art history degrees are working at Starbucks, and yet my friends who are welders and plumbers can charge $200 an hour for their know-how. You tell me what's wrong with this picture.

[Marjorie]

"increase graduation rates" at the expense of education? Please.

[Christopher Knight]

D Willis makes a claim that a "30%+ dropout rate" is the result of changes in CTE (Career and Technical Education) but offers nothing to connect one fact to the other. CTE is without doubt a good thing, just like arts and foreign language; but who could seriously suggest that a single course of anything prepares an educated workforce and will boost graduation rates?

[AC]

I'm so happy I graduated HS before all this random nonsense happened. At the time, I didn't know that I would be so interested in my foreign language or art classes. But my foreign language classes and band allowed my GPA to stay above a 3.0-and keep SOME SORT of interest in school.
Go figure...but, now, I'm majoring in a foreign language, and if I'd have to pick a second one to double in? Performing Arts. Some people use the arts/language classes to keep them interested in school... they especially use the arts as a method of escaping all the "formalities" of studying for a test and other aspects of classes.
While I think math/science education is just as important, art and language education is just as important, if not more important. Please waste CA's money in a different way.

[J.Tomchin]

Artists make things.
Sometimes they use the same methods and tools as mechanics, cooks, carpenters and bricklayers.
If "Art Education" taught how Art involves skills, perhaps more high school kids would want to learn.

[Barbara]

From New York's Center for Arts Education: "one course in Career and Technical Education does not a CTE education make." The legislation posits that "the CTE course could help these kids find a job or be better prepared for a job. That flies in the face of best practices in CTE. The best CTE programs also include rigorous academics, including the arts. A Career and Technical Education which is as the name would suggest, being very skill oriented and grounded workforce training and preparedness, doesn't happen in a single course of anything." I understand that CTE classes have been minimized at the expense of putting everyone on the college track, and I get that that has proven (?) a misguided strategy. But I would say that an education that includes access to arts education and yes, CTE classes are of value that should not be posited in opposition to one another. We are shortchanging students and still not doing anything substanitive enough to claim better graduation rates because of access to one class (out of how many!)? We are all fooling ourselves at the expense of our students and future workforce.

[Professor Richard Kahn, LAVC Music Department]

Just what we need. Another batch of under-educated wanna-be musicians with no background in their intended field of study. Congratulations for perpetuating the myth that musicians are academically and artistically moronic, with little or no regard for aesthetics, and are a blight on the social texture of our society

[CTE Teacher]

Funny how people like Marjorie ("increase graduation rates" at the expense of education? Please) seem to think that the learning involved in mastering career-technical coursework is not a part of "real" education. Is learning how to install, maintain, troubleshoot and repair the transmission, braking, and power-steering systems of a car less mentally rigorous than learning the principles and elements of art? Are you afraid of getting your hands dirty? There are a lot more similarities between a mechanic and a surgeon than there are between a portrait painter and a surgeon, my dear. Try reading "Shop class as Soulcraft" - it's been among the top 25 on the New York Times bestseller list for while now.

[D Willis]

Christopher Knight - Have you checked out Plank's research on how CTE contributes toward student persistence to graduation? The magic formula is a ratio of one CTE course for every two academic courses, the result of such a schedule being the lowest incidents of students dropping out of school. While you are verifying that data, please also check out "Getting Real - Helping teens find their future" by Kenneth Gray. Specifically, read the chapter 3, which deals with drop-outs, the reasons they decide to quit, and one major factor the Gates Foundation found common to drop outs as to what would have kept them in school... you guessed it - CTE.

I do not claim that CTE is the Holy Grail... but I will firmly defend the position that the last two decades of neglect it has suffered has not served our students, the economy, or the nation at all. This legislation is not out to put a stake in the heart of the arts, it is about educational parity and freedom of choice, things that do not currently exist in k-12 education. All the fear-mongering that the Arts and Language educators have stirred up about AB2446 comes down to a turf war and the fear of loss of job security.

[Mark Slavkin]

California's minimum high school graduation requirements are shamefully inadequate. Rather than battle over which minimal option is more valuable, we need to push for "both/and." Our state universities require a year of fine arts and foreign language for admission. Our high schools should make both a requirement too. Meanwhile, we must also do a better job of preparing kids with tangible skills for careers; not just a single course, but across the curriculum.

Our Legislators need to upgrade graduation requirements across the board, and not pit one worthy curricular goal against another.