Artspiration – Santa Clara County Arts Initiative

Wondering about this picture? Its the chart with the classes that have mastered piano playing on different songs in the Let’s Play Piano curriculum.  But its so much more than that…    

Jackson Elementary School, under the leadership of Principal Patrick Buchser, has been transformed into a math and music school.  Morgan Hill Unified School District Superintendent Dr Wes Smith and Buchser reopened the school in Fall 2012 as an elementary with a clear focus…and focus it has!  

I had the opportunity to visit Jackson last week and to say I was “amazed” is an understatement. If I lived in Morgan Hill, I’d be sleeping on the front steps until I could get my children into the program.   

Pictures speak a thousand words, and those from my Jackson visit can’t speak the volumes that need to be shared about the quality of instructors and admirable leadership at Jackson. Students are receiving music instructor from first-year teacher (and superstar) Amanda Knudtzon.  

She is using The Mind Institute program for Music this year and I was very impressed with the skills acquired by the students since late Fall. They are able to easily demonstrate their work using 5 fingers on the keyboard and can write music in different ways.  

ALL students were engaged when I visited, and I stayed a while so the novelty of a visitor wasn’t why they were focused and participatory. Ms. Knudtzon has a gift. She commands herself in front of a class better than most seasoned teachers and shares history and poetry while covering music, both vocal instrumental.

The students at Jackson are clearly focused and engaged. When I spoke with them, they were energized and sincere – they love their music classes. More importantly, they love their teacher.   

Yeah…I can see why….

Today was judgment day for the Downtown Doors program…literally!  

Downtown Doors is sponsored by the San Jose Downtown Association, under the leadership of Blage Zelalich. This year’s competition welcomed 160 different pieces of middle and high school student artwork. 16 high schools and 2 middle schools submitted pieces into this year’s competition

And the winners are….well….its a little too early to make that announcement but here’s what I can share.    

After 4 rounds of high pressured judging, 25 pieces of artwork from both public and private school students were selected. They ranged from hand drawings to photography to other assorted digital images. Students will be honored on Friday, June 7th at the San Jose Museum of Art.

Can’t wait to see the artwork that we selected on downtown doors and utility boxes!  

California Assembly Bill 580, an arts-funding bill, moved a step closer to passage as advocates push ahead with the more optimistic economic environment.   

This bill, introduced by Assemblymember Adrin Nazarian (D- Sherman Oaks), would provide some $75 million a year from the general fund to go to the California Arts Council. The bill made it out of the committee on Arts, Entertainment, Sports, Tourism and Internet Media this week on a 4-2 vote.

Next step? Appropriations. This is where a similar bill in 2009 died due to a challenging economic environment.   

This funding would increase funding to the California Arts Council significantly, considering its current allocation is $1 million/year. But just 12 years ago, in 2000-2001, the Arts Council was funded at a level of $32 million a year! Then Governor Davis slashed funding for the Arts Council during his terms by 94%.

Current funding for the arts in California is approximately 14 cents per year for every resident in California, ranking our state dead last…next to Texas (15 cents/resident) and Georgia (16 cents/resident).   

We’re following this closely. We’re interested. And while we’re not taking a stance or making any recommendations here, we are hopeful that arts funding increases in California. Standing by…

CreaTV hosted a teacher focus group meeting on April 10th, 2013. The goal? Find ways to get more educational programming on its stations to promote public education as well as identify more ways to get equipment into the hands of students.

CreaTV is a San Jose-based public access television station. By the end of this school year, its MAP Grants program will have put close to $1 million in professional equipment into the hands of students in the San Jose area.

Click HERE for more information on Channel 28 and its services for education…and check out some great television shows while you’re at it!

More than 350 pieces of public school artwork were submitted into this year’s Young Artist Showcase. Judging by 17 respected education, government and arts leaders took place on Friday, April 5th. Special thanks for judging goes out to Assemblymember Paul Fong and his Chief of Staff in his district, Leslie Bulbak, for their assistance.

Is the suspense killing you? We’re sure it is. But…we can give you a little sneak peak into the selection and let you know the students will be honored in a ceremony here at the County Office on September 12th, 2013 from 4:30-6 pm.

Dozens of tables were set up in the San Jose Room (okay…it was really more like 51 tables) with groups of artwork based on grade ranges (preK, K-2, 3-5, 6-8, 9-12, and adult special education).

What a success! Thirty-two pieces of artwork were selected for the permanent collection that will be on display here at the Santa Clara County Office of Education. Fifteen school districts were represented in the selections, including: Cupertino, Mtn View Whisman, Santa Clara, Campbell, Campbell UHSD, Lakeside, Milpitas, Cambrian, Evergreen, Union, Orchard, Berryessa, Saratoga, San Jose, SCCOE.

For the Happy Hollow Park and Zoo arts program, seventeen pieces were chosen to be on a one-year display that will be in their Picnic Basket area. The pieces hail from eleven different districts including: Milpitas, Berryessa, Union, Cambrian, Moreland, Santa Clara, Cupertino, Lakeside, Santa Clara, Saratoga, East Side.

We were tickled pink that this year’s entries were more than 75% of what we had entered in recent years, courtesy of great outreach from staff and parent networks throughout the valley.

Can’t wait for 2014!

We are sharing this information as many of you ask about pending legislation that involves the arts.

Assembly Bill 580 is a new legislative bill that would increase appropriations for the California Arts Council (CAC) from $1M to $75M. It will be formally introduced to the state assembly this Tuesday, April 9 at 9 a.m.   

On April 1st (no foolin’), the Santa Clara County Office of Education hosted the 11th Annual Arts In Your Classroom Conference.   

This year’s conference focused heavily on the integration of the arts into the new Common Core State Standards, or rather the core and how it supports the arts.

The evening began with an engaging keynote by CreaTV‘s Executive Director, Suzanne St John Crane. From there, the close to 100 participants were engaged in their chosen two-hour hands-on arts activity, ranging from theatre to digital arts and visual arts to design integration.  

Most impressive was the team from Youth Speaks that closed out the night’s event and held captive an audience who was more than impressed with their work and wanting more from their presentations. Special thanks to Arts In Your Classroom partners, San Jose State University’s Lurie College of Education and the Montalvo Arts Center.   

The Young Artist Showcase, now in its 17th year, has a collection of more than 600 pieces of permanent artwork. And much of that artwork is housed at the Santa Clara County Office of Education…but not all of it.   

Happy Hollow Park and Zoo is the home to a special collection of animal-based drawings and paintings. But we also have many of the pieces of our collection out in businesses and legislative offices.

Assemblymember Paul Fong just moved into his new offices so it was the perfect time to jazz up his walls with art by county students, particularly those in his jurisdiction.

Many other legislators and city halls have our Young Artist Showcase artwork on display. If you know of an office that might be good to host our artwork on a temporary basis (3-12 months), please track us down.  

The County Arts Network, a team of district and site administrators focused on arts instruction, visited Stipe Elementary School on Friday, March 22nd for its quarterly meeting. This meeting focused on low/no cost arts offerings by non-profits in the Santa Clara County whose mission is to provide arts experiences for students.   

Led by Principal Jenay Kiddoo, 4th grade students performed their recorders for us. Although not the holidays, their rendition of “Jingle Bells” was very much in tune and energized. What was most impressive with the student performers was that they could play without adult oversight….ready to go and focused on listening carefully and playing for an audience of adults who were eating up their energy!   

Great job, Stipe Elementary. The Oak Grove School District continues to be a model district for its district-wide emphasis on the arts.

On March 21st, a select group of teachers at Joseph George Middle School in San Jose’s Alum Rock School District participated in a special professional development session. An arts-focused middle school, George has had many trainings in recent years to help teachers infuse more arts into core subjects and engage students in effective ways.     

Caitlin Johnston spent an hour and a half with teachers in a very practical presentation. They started with elements of stories that transcend all subjects. Collaborative story building with different segments can apply to language arts but also in steps of completing math problems or chronicling the steps of a scientific process.

For example, if each student was responsible for telling the next part of a story with these sentence starters, imagine how many subjects could be addressed:

Once upon a time…

And then…

When suddenly…

Finally…

And the moral of the story was…

The nice part about this type of activity is that it also reinforces the new Common Core State Standards. It requires students to follow the process of being a speaker and listener. It requires building upon the ideas of others. It highlights active listening and review, particularly if students were working on reviewing for a test. What is the process of reducing fractions? division with remainders? the water cycle?   

Great connections in theatre to all subjects when deliberate thought is involved. Wouldn’t you agree?