Lessons from my Christmas Wish List: The Importance of Arts Education

Drawing paper, a canon camera, a brother sewing machine, and new dance gear have all been on my Christmas wish lists. Fortunately, my village of family and friends encouraged my artistic desires. My parents paid for art, sewing, and dance lessons. My brother drove me to the art store and the dance studio. My village aunties bought me fashion books and showed up to my dance recitals. Unfortunately, not everyone has this much support for their artistic pursuits. A lot of lower income students’ only exposure to the arts is through schools for which art programs are increasingly cut from the budget as schools place more emphasis on common core subjects in order to achieve higher scores on standardized tests. Arts education is declining even though it helps students develop academically and emotionally.

Students are losing access to arts education. For example, StateImpact Oklahoma, an organization that partners with public radio stations to deliver policy to the people, cited Oklahoma State Department of Education data showing drastic cuts in fine arts classes. According to their education publication on decline in school art programs, over 1,000 fine arts classes have been cut between 2014 and 2018, leaving approximately 30% of Oklahoma public schools without classes in the arts. That is, no visual arts, no music, no performing arts, and no public speaking in over a quarter of Oklahoma public schools. Lower income schools are hit the worst by these cuts even though studies suggest that low-income students with high arts outperform low-income students with low arts. Numerous other studies indicate that arts improve academic achievement, but what other academic benefits do the arts provide?

Arts education benefits students’ academic engagement. Brookings is the first private institution to analyze national public policy. A 2019 Brookings report found new evidence to support the benefits of arts education. A large part of their sample was elementary schools, the primary target of arts programs. Brookings found that, in elementary schools, arts education positively impacts college aspirations and school engagement. Specifically, arts programs made students more likely to say school was more enjoyable, contained programs that kept them interested, and made them learn to think in new ways. These benefits to students’ academic lives illustrate that arts play a role in shaping children’s educational experiences. The arts are playing an even more significant role in students’ lives as they help combat the stress of the pandemic.

People are turning to art as a coping mechanism during the pandemic. Earth Day focuses on mobilizing people for the future of the earth. Part of their work is organizing communities such as Artists for the Earth, which creates art to engage people with environmental issues. In an attempt to advocate for this program, Earth Day highlighted how creation can help coping with COVID-19, mentioning music as a means of bringing people together and citing studies claiming just 45 minutes of art can help relieve stress. How does this translate to art in schools? Earth Day’s statements about music highlight how art creates community, suggesting the arts promote unity amongst students. The above Brookings Study even implies that art is a means for empathizing with others. Meanwhile art’s beneficial effects on stress demonstrate how art can influence students’ well being, which is more important now than ever.

Arts education shapes students academically and socially, but arts programs are among the first cut because it is not a tested subject. If we are going to continue to view assessments as important, here is a quiz on arts education, which will further highlight the positive impact of art. These benefits are largely statistics based, but I know the benefits from personal experience. The drawing paper fueled my interest in the visual arts and now I have my own exhibit. The Canon camera helped me connect with my world, and now I am helping my mom capture pictures and video messages for her students. The Brother sewing machine reignited my passion for fashion and now I can easily make cloth masks for family and friends. The dance gear served as confirmation of my love of dance, and now I am the first person to have danced at my high school’s graduation. The arts have helped guide my love for my friends and family and my interests in education and social justice. In short, the arts have changed my life and arts education can change the lives of thousands of children.

A digital art piece I made to cope with the pandemic.