HomeMy WebLinkAbout2005-04-07; Arts Commission; MinutesMINUTES
Carlsbad Arts Commission
April 7, 2005
Carlsbad Council Chambers
Commissioners Present: Rita Francis, Barbara Iserloth, Gary Hill,
Felicia Shaw, Kelvin Okamoto, Fran Carrillo
Commissioners Absent: Ron Juncal
Chair Hill called The Meeting to Order at 8:00 a.m.
Minutes
On motion by Commissioner Francis, the Arts Commission unanimously approved the
March Minutes.
Presentation by Jim Hall of the Carlsbad Playreaders
Mr. Hall gave the Arts Commission a brief history and described the mission/goal of the
Carlsbad Playreaders.
Discussion on Arts and Education Issues
Chair Hill discussed with Commissioners on how and why the Commission needs to
educate itself further in order to plan for arts and culture in the future. He would like to
see the arts play a more general role in everyday life instead of just for entertainment.
Commissioner Francis extended an invitation to the Arts Commissioners to the Arts-in-
Education Committee meetings. Commissioner Carrillo spoke during a recent Arts-in-
Education Committee meeting regarding advocacy and funding. Commissioner Shaw
stated that businesses in the community needed to be advocates for the arts. Discussion
ensued about arts education outside of schools and the American for the Arts article
regarding arts and secondary schools (attached).
Commissioners' Reports
Commissioner Carrillo reported she attended the Arts-in-Education Committee.
Commissioner Francis explained how the Arts-in-Education Committee is run.
Commissioner Shaw reported she attended the recent Gallery opening. She asked the
Arts Commission for permission to contact New Village Arts to reiterate the March Arts
Commission meeting discussion with the Housing and Redevelopment Director regarding
the City's requirements for partnerships in the Village area.
Commissioner Iserloth reported she recently visited the COAL Gallery. She stated her
impression was mixed about the quality of work exhibited.
Commissioner Okamoto reported he attended the recent Gallery opening.
Chair Hill reported he attended the breakfast for the juried artists and the recent Gallery
opening.
Manager's Report
Colleen Finnegan reported that staff was still working on the budget process and the
strategic plan. The Multicultural Arts Festival held in March was very well attended. A
homestay visit by students from our sister city in Futtsu, Japan, just finished. There is
one more opera caravan. Festejando a las Madrecitas will take place in Holiday Park on
May 8. The Carlsbad Music Festival will take place the last weekend of April. No jazz
concerts will be held at Magee Park this summer.
Meeting adjourned at 8:23 a.m.
MERICANS FOR THE ARTS
VOLUME 1 NUMBER 9
INVOLVEMENT IN The Arts and Success in
Secondary School
Americans for the Arts is pleased
to present this new benchmark
research study demonstrating the
positive impact of the arts on
education. Examining Imgtudi-
nal data of 25,000 students,
Dr. Catteratt's research reveals
how involvement in the arts is
Jinked to higher academic perfor-
mance, increased standardized
test scores, more community ser-
vice, and lower drop-out rates.
Using sophisticated research
methods, he also demonstrates
that these cognitive and develop-
mental benefits are reaped by
students regardless of their soaoe-
ccmorrdc status.
INTRO DUCTION
This paper describes relationships between student involvement
in the arts and academic achievement. The analysis is based on a
longitudinal study of 25,000 secondary school students spon-
sored by the United States Department of Education.' This nation-
al data collection project launched in 1988 has supported leading
research on student achievement in recent years, including stud-
ies addressing school organization, curriculum and the problems
of students at risk. This paper presents the first reported analysis
of information in this national survey about student participation
in the arts. Here the focus is arts involvement and its potential ties
to academic success in the middle and high school years. The
analysis is straightforward and largely descriptive. Yet despite
the simplicity of the approach, the results seem unprecedented
in their grasp of how arts-rich versus arts-poor youngsters do in
school. The findings are likely to gamer a warm reception by read-
ers necessarily lacking much in the way of hard data supporting
what philosophers eloquently contend about the meaning of arts
in human development3
The study is reported in three sections.
AMERICANS FOR THE ARTS
ABOUT THE
AUTHOR
James S. Catterall is
Professor and
Assistant Dean at the
UCLA Graduate School
of Education &
Information Studies.
He is also Co-Director
(with Professor Merlin
C.Wittrock)ofthe
UCLA Imagination
Project, a group of fac-
ulty, graduate students
and arts professionals
engaged in research
and curriculum devel-
opment concerning the
arts and human devel-
opment, Address:
UCLA Department of
Education, 3341 Moore
Hall, Los Angeles, CA
90095-1521. E-mail:
jamesc@gseis.ucla.edu.
The first section describes student participation rates
in 8th and icth grades in various school and communi-
ty based arts activities such as school band or drama
productions, arts classes in school, and art-related
lessons outside of school.
The second section describes academic performance
levels and selected behaviors and attitudes of students
at grades 8 and 10, for two student groups with differ-
ent experiences with the arts: one group is students
reporting high levels of overall involvement in the arts;
the other is students with low arts involvement As one
might expect, there are systematic differences between
these two groups favoring the arts-rich on all mea-
sures. That such an outcome is expected stems from
the fact that opportunities to participate in the arts are
typically higher for children from more educated and
affluent families — and these children tend to do bet-
ter in school anyway for various reasons.
In an effort to control for so obvious a challenge to
general claims for the importance of the arts when it
comes to school performance, a different analytical
strategy is used in the third section. Here, relation-
ships between involvement in the aits and achieve-
ment are examined, this time for children from homes
in the lowest quartile of the family income and parent
education spectrum. The achievement differences
between high and low-arts youth within this economi-
cally disadvantaged group remain significant.
Moreover, the importance of consistent involvement in
the arts shows up in increased advantages for arts-
rich (even though economically poor) youngsters by
the toth grade.
A substantial case for the importance of the arts in
the academic lives of middle and high schoolers is
the primary implication of this research.
SECTION 1: ARTS PARTICIPATION
RATES IN MIDDLE AND HIGH SCHOOL
The national survey used for this work provides the most
comprehensive data on student participation in the arts
available anywhere. Different indicators were used in the
8th and loth grade surveys;3 summaries of student par-
ticipation rates are shown in Rgure lA and iB (at right).
As shown in Rgure lA above, about half of 8th graders
report taking an art or music class at least once per
week. Only about one-tenth of 8th graders take drama
classes. Approximately one fifth of students are
involved in band, orchestra, or chorus. Art museum
attendance is reported by 42 percent of 8th graders;
over half in this group report attending science and
history museums with their families.
By loth grade, regular involvement in the arts in
school seems to drop-off. As shown in Figure iB, only
about a third of students pursued art, music, or drama
classes as pth and loth graders. The percentages of
students studying the arts in school for more than two
semesters during this time period are about 8 percent
for art, 15 percent for music and 2 percent for dramatic
arts. About one-fourth of students report taking out of
school arts-related classes during grades 9 and 10,
with about one in five of alt students taking classes
once per week or more.
MONOGRAPHS VOLUME 1 NUMBER9
SECTION 2: HIGH VERSUS LOW
ARTS INVOLVEMENT AND GENERAL
STUDENT PERFORMANCE
The statistics shown above for 8th and loth graders
would support various perspectives on arts involve-
ment for secondary school students. Analysis of rela-
tionships between the arts and academic success
used the indicators shown in Figures lA and iB to
develop scales indicating overall arts-involvement lev-
els at grade 8 and over grades 8 and 10 combined. A
point was assigned for participation in a given arts
class or activity, an additional point for serving as an
officer of an arts-related endeavor (e.g., president of
the drama club) and additional points for engaging in
added years or high weekly frequency of an activity
(e.g., taking lessons outside of school). Museum
attendance by student families was assigned fraction-
al points (one-third of a point).' Our main resulting
scale — showing the point totals by student for cumu-
lative involvement in the arts over both grades 8 and
10 — shows a total of 2 or fewer points for the lowest-
involved fourth of all students, and shows about 7 or
more points for the highest-involved quarter of alt stu-
dents. This means something tike the following: stu-
dents in our low arts group typically enrolled in one
arts course in either grade with no additional involve-
ment in the arts. Students in our high arts group may
have taken 2-3 arts classes, participated in the band
and drama clubs, and may be taking regular lessons
outside of school. About 3 percent of all students
earn zero points on this scale; another 3 percent
score more than 12 points.
THE ARTS AND EIGHTH GRADE STUDENT
PERFORMANCE
The highest and lowest arts-involved quartiles of all
8th graders and then loth graders serve as a basis for
general analyses of academic achievement. In the dis-
cussion below, we refer to these groups as (high-arts)
and (low-arts) students. Shown in Figure 2A (below)
are various indicators of academic achievement as of
eighth grade, by respective level of arts involvement.
AMERICANS FOR THE ARTS
The 8th grade academic achievement Indicators
shown in Figure 2A favor the arts-rich, and include
the following:
English grades: Nearly So percent of high-arts youth
report mostly As or Bs in English, in contrast to about
64 percent of tow-arts youth.
Standardized test scores: The national survey adminis-
tered a variety of standardized tests to students every
two years. The test score reported in Figure 2A for 8th
graders reflects a ranking of students on a composite of
verbal and mathematics tests. About two-thirds of high-
arts students scored in the top 2 quartiles (or top half)
of composite standardized test performance; in con-
trast, only about 43 percent of low-arts students made
it into the top half of the test performance distribution.
Persistence in school: Another marked contrast is
shown for the high-arts versus low-arts 8th graders.
Although dropping out of school is relatively infre-
quent between grades 8 and 10, only 1.4 percent of
students with high arts-involvement as of grade 8
dropped out over the subsequent 2 years; the dropout
rate was four times higher for low-arts students.
Boredom in school: Ask any middle school kid or par-
ent: boredom in school runs fairly high among all 8th
grade students. But those not involved in the arts turn
out to be more bored, more of the time: about 49 per-
cent of all low-arts students claim they are bored in
school half or most of the time. A still-high 42 percent
of high-arts students make the same claim of substan-
tial disinterest with whatis going on in school.
THE ARTS AND TENTH GRADE STUDENT
PERFORMANCE
The loth grade analysis used a scale of arts involve-
ment that grouped students according to overall levels
of involvement in the arts for both 8th and loth grades
— using the scaling process outlined above — and
compared the highest arts-involved quarter of the stu-
dent population with the lowest arts-involved quarter
of all students. Because available indicators at grade
io differed somewhat from (and were more numerous
than) those available for 8th graders, the report shows
a similar and extended set of achievement, behavior
and attitude measures for loth graders, shown in
Rgures 26 and 2C (bottom and right).
Figure 28 (bottom left) shows several academic
performance contrasts between high-arts and low-
arts loth graders.
Standardized test scores: Nearly 75 percent of high-arts
loth graders scored in the top half of the composite (ver-
bal and math skills combined) test score distribution.
Only 45 percent of the low-arts youth met this standard.
Reading performance: Paralleling standardized test
performance, about two-thirds of the high-arts stu-
dents scored in the top half of the reading performance
distribution for loth graders.' Only 43 percent of low-
arts students met the reading performance standard.
Tests of History, Citizenship, and Geography: The bal-
ance favoring high-arts involvement for loth graders
appears about the same for the National Educational
Longitudinal Study of 1988 (NELS:88) test in history,
citizenship and geography as for reading and the over-
all standardized test composite: about 71 percent of
high-arts students scored in the top half of the perfor-
MONOGRAPHS VOLUME 1 NUMBER9
mance distribution on this test, compared to about 46
percent of low-arts students.
ADDITIONAL 10TH GRADE INDICATORS
We explored in a very preliminary way the NELS.-88
data base for other contrasts associated with student
involvement in the arts. Three of these comparisons
are shown in Figure 2C (at right):
Community service performance: High arts-involved stu-
dents are more likely to involve themselves in communi-
ty service. A very strong majority, 86 percent, of low-arts
students rarely engage in community service activities
such as volunteering for social programs. In comparison,
more than one-third of high-arts youth perform commu-
nity service activities occasionally or more frequently.
Attitudes about community service: Reported involve-
ment in community service seems to go hand in hand
with student beliefs about its importance. About 47
percent of high-arts loth graders believe that commu-
nity service is important or very important, in contrast
to only 34 percent of low-arts students.
Making time for the arts: An important issue lurking
in these data describing student involvement in the
arts is just how students more involved in the arts
make time available for this involvement. This is an
issue deserving focused attention in inquiries about
why the arts matter, and how the arts may contribute
positively to the development of children and adoles-
cents. Presented here is just a smalt glimpse of such
an inquiry, namely the time youth in the NELS:88 sur-
vey spend watching television.
* About twice as many high-arts icth graders report
watching less than an hour of television per day than
low-arts students — 28 percent versus 15 percent.
* The relationship for high television watching is the
reciprocal: more low-arts youth report watching three
hours or more of television then high-arts youth — 21
to 35 percent.
INTERIM CONCLUSIONS: GOOD NEWS
FOR THE ARTS, BUT WHAT ABOUT FAMILY
BACKGROUND DIFFERENCES?
The preceding analyses and displays show unambigu-
ous positive academic, behavioral and attitudinal
associations with student involvement in the arts.
High-arts students in general score better on academ-
ic tests, achieve more in school, and exhibit more com-
munity-minded values than low-arts students. While
from the point of view of the arts enthusiast there
seems to be much to cheer about in these findings, it
does not take extensive experience with developmen-
tal and educational inquiry to realize that involvement
in the arts is neither the .only nor the most important
difference between the high and low-arts groups com-
pared. An unquestionable substantial contributor to
the differences just shown is the fact that children dif-
fer in their access to, and engagement with, the arts.
A crucial difference is the fact that children from
more educated and affluent households are more like-
ly to be involved with the arts. This is expected
because of various advantages that go hand in hand
with socio-economic status (SES):
* ability to afford private lessons
* increased parent resources to transport children to
arts activities
* living in more affluent school districts where arts
programs are more prevalent
AMERICANS FOR THE ARTS
* possibly more parent encouragement for the arts
because of their own advantaged and comparatively
arts-rich school years and adult lives
This view is substantiated by family income statistics
about the high and low-arts groups in our database
used for this analysis. The chart below shows a clear
relationship between SES and arts involvement in the
national sample enlisted for this research:
A simple symmetry is displayed in the chart above:
* A student's probability of high arts involvement is
twice as high if his/her family is in the highest family
income quartile than in the lowest quartile.
* Conversely, a student is twice as likely to show low
arts involvement if he/she is from a low SES family
than from a high SES family.
* Thus high-SES youth are considerably over-repre-
sented in our high-arts group; low-SES youth are con-
siderably over-represented in our low-arts group.
(The strong relationship between family background
and arts participation is also noted in early analyses
based on the National Assessment of Educational
Progress and a 1981 report of the Second National
Art Assessment.)'
So while the various advantages to arts involvement
reported above seem substantial and powerful, it is by
no means simple to tease out just what the arts per se
have to do with this. Without attempting a fine-grained
analysis, a substantial portion of the academic advan-
tages associated with the arts should be attributed to
just who has access to and encouragement for the
arts. At the same time, not all of the advantages
should be assumed to be tied up in this primary selec-
tion factor. A case for this contention is supported by
the subsequent analysis in Section 3, where we exam-
ine relationships between the arts and student perfor-
mance within the low SES quartile of all students — a
group for whom differences in access to the arts based
on family economic resources are considerably more
constrained. Besides arguing that such an analysis
tends to meet the SES relationship challenge just
described, we have ample additional reason for an
interest in children from homes where parent income
and education levels are low. The economically disad-
vantaged core of our youth have drawn a great deal of
attention from educators and education policy schol-
ars in their own right for decades — children in this
group, on average, have the greatest difficulties suc-
ceeding in school and as adults. Far more poor than
affluent children fail in school, drop out without gradu-
ating, and eventually lead adult lives dependent on
public services such as welfare and involved in pub-
licly costly behaviors such a criminal activity.7
Here is an exploration of what the arts mean for
economically disadvantaged 8th and loth graders.
SECTION 3: ARTS AND THE ECONOMI-
CALLY DISADVANTAGED STUDENT
This section replicates the analysis performed for all
8th and loth graders above, in this case comparing
high-arts and low-arts students from within the least
affluent quarter of the nation's student population.
The analysis procedures are essentially the same, with
the exception of restricting the inquiry to students
whose families are in the lowest parent education and
income (or SES) quartile. This means that only the
poorest 6,500 out of the original 25,000 8th graders
are considered; this group is then examined for stu-
dents meeting the low and high arts-involvement crite-
ria established for the analysis in Section 2.'
Consistent with data shown in the chart is an observa-
tion that among the low SES youth in the NELS:88
MONOGRAPHS VOLUME! NUMBER9
survey, about four times as many youngsters fall into
the low-arts group as into the high-arts group. It is
these two groups that now draw interest.
ARTS AND 8TH GRADE STUDENT PERFOR-
MANCE IN THE LOW SES O.UARTILE
Paralleling the analysis for all students shown in
Section 2 above, we here examine academic perfor-
mance indicators for high-arts versus low-arts stu-
dents from low SES families. The overall performance
levels of the entire economically disadvantaged
group are lower than performance levels for all stu-
dents, as we would expect But the positive relation-
ships between arts engagement and academic perfor-
mance remain robust and systematic, as shown ini-
tially in figure 3A (at right). Even more important, the
academic advantages for arts-involved economically
disadvantaged youngsters are quite pronounced by
grade 10, especially as shown in Figure 36 (at right).
English grades: About 8 percent more high-arts stu-
dents report mostly As and Bs in English over grades 6-
8. While the absolute increment between the two
groups is 8 percentage points, the percentage of high-
arts students showing lofty English grades (64.5 per-
cent) is 14.4 percent higher than the percentage of low-
arts students (56.4 percent) doing this well in English.'
Standardized test scores: An added 5 percent of high-
arts students score in the top half of the composite
test score distribution (reading, verbal and mathemat-
ics tests). This is a 20.4 percent difference favoring
high-arts youngsters.
Dropping out of school: Dropout rates are higher for
all students with low SES family backgrounds. But the
dropout rate between grades 8 and 10 for low-arts stu-
dents (9.4 percent) is 45 percent higher than the rate
for high-arts students (6.5 percent).
Boredom in school: Student reports of being bored in
school remain high, but boredom levels are slightly
lower overall for low SES youngsters than for all 8th
graders. For the low SES students, only 41 percent of
high-arts students claim high levels of boredom, in
contrast to 46 percent of low-arts 8th graders.
Student self concept: High arts-involved, low SES
youngsters report higher self concepts by about 5.5
percentage points — 9.2 percent higher than low-arts
students. The self concept scale is based on student
answers to questions about how much they value
themselves, their abilities, and their achievements.
Behavior and attitudes about volunteerism and com-
munity service: Conforming to what is reported above
for all students, within the low SES group, high-arts
students report more community service activities by
AMERICANS FOR THE ARTS
more than 10 percent; high-arts students also report
with considerably more frequency that volunteer work
is somewhat to very important (by a percentage differ-
ence of about one-third).
ARTS AND 10TH GRADE STUDENT PERFOR-
MANCE IN THE LOW SES QUARTILE
Above is a report of modest but significant and sys-
tematic academic performance differences favoring
high-arts 8th grade students within the low SES quar-
tile. Below is an examination of academic performance
differences related to arts involvement by loth grade
for the same low SES group.
To summarize in a few words: the academic perfor-
mance differences for low SES children linked to arts
involvement are greater and more significant by the
loth grade. This contrast reflects a better and more
sustained indicator of arts involvement — the high-
versus low-arts groups are based now on a composite
of indicators of arts involvement over both 8th and
loth grades. And the outcomes are more meaningful
because by the spring of loth grade, academic perfor-
mance tends to get closer to what student high school
careers will eventually amount to.
As shown in Figure 38, the academic performance
levels of high-arts loth graders outstrip the perfor-
mance levels of low-arts students by more than half
across the board — the shares scoring in the top two
quartiles of the standardized test composite; the pro-
portions scoring in the top half of the reading test
score distribution; the fraction reading at standard for
grade 10, and the share scoring in the top half of the
test distribution in history, citizenship, and geography.
Various additional indicators of advantage for arts-
involved students within the low SES ranks also show
up in NELS:88 data. Several are shown in Figure 30
(bottom left).
As reported for students more generally, low SES
students line up along arts involvement lines when it
comes to community service practices and attitudes:
* more than twice as many high-arts low SES students
are actively involved in community service
* 21 percent more consider community service important"
Again, consistent with what is reported for all students,
high-arts youth from low SES family backgrounds
report watching less television than low-arts youth:
* nearly one-third more low-arts youth report watching
3 hours or more per weekday
* about 23 percent more high-arts youngsters than
low-arts youngsters report watching one hour or less
of television on a typical school night
CONCLUSIONS
This study finds considerable advantages for youth high-
ly engaged in the arts during grades 8 and 10 when com-
pared to arts-poor students. Academic grades, standard-
ized test scores, measured reading levels and attitudes
concerning commitment to community were all higher
for students maintaining high levels of activity in music,
chorus, drama and the visual arts. And the academic
performance differences were quite pronounced by loth
grade, where students demonstrated consistent involve-
ment (or lack of involvement) through two years of data
collection across the middle and early high school years.
This pattern holds both generally in this 25,000 student
sample, and most importantly for students in the
lowest quartile of family education and income.
Explaining these differences? This brief report does not
explore the theoretical rationales for why the arts might
MONOGRAPHS VOLUME1 NUMBER9
matter in ways suggested, although much can be said
about such foundations and has been documented in
previous work by the author and others. These can be
grouped into major categories reflecting the various
roles that the arts play in promoting cognitive develop-
ment (from specific relations such as the influence of
music on perception and comprehension of mathemati-
cal structure to the more general roles of imagery and
representation on cognition). The arts serve to broaden
access to meaning by offering ways of thinking and ways
of representation to youngsters possessing a spectrum
of "intelligences" scattered unevenly across the popula-
tion. The arts also show links to student motivation and
engagement in school, attitudes that contribute to acad-
emic persistence and achievement Many arts activities,
particularly the performing arts, also promote communi-
ty — advancing shared purpose and team spirit required
to perform an ensemble musical or dramatic work, or to
design and paint a public mural. With the promotion of
community surely comes empathy and general attach-
ment to the larger values of the school and the adult
society which high school students will soon join.
Success by artistic association? The arts show advan-
tages when it comes to academic achievement in the
relationships we describe. Even in the absence of
causal attributions yet to be proved in our work with
[his national database the perspectives we show elicit
another reason to promote more involvement in the
arts for more youngsters. This analysis of the NELS:88
survey establishes that students involved in the arts
are doing better in school than those who are not —
For whatever constellation of reasons. Research into
academic achievement going back three decades and
nore argues that the motivation and success of one's
jeers have an influence on how a youngster does in
school. At very least, these data support the con-
:ention that rubbing shoulders with arts-involved
/oungsters in the middle and high school years is, on
average, a smart idea when it comes to choosing
riends and activities.
Jnequal access to the arts. Although not the main
:heme of this study, the data support popular convic-
tions as well as research concluding that access to the
arts is inequitably distributed in our society. Students
Prom poor and less educated families are much more
likely to record low levels of participation in the arts
during middle and high school; affluent youngsters
are much more likely to show high engagement in the
arts. The arts do matter — not only as worthwhile
experiences in their own right, but also as instruments
of cognitive growth and development and as agents of
motivation for school success.
A FINAL NOTE — SCALING UP RESEARCH
ATTENTION TO THE ARTS
More than eight years into the most important educa-
tional survey addressing educational conditions and
outcomes for American youth, this brief exploration
appears to be the first analysis of student participa-
tion in the arts to appear in print. The likely reasons
for this speak to the lagging place of the arts in the
imaginations of most contemporary education leaders,
policy makers and researchers. When academics have
turned their lenses to the powerful NELS:88 survey,
the issues they explore concentrate on the tried and
true, even if their questions are important: Why do
children fail? Who drops out of school? What curricu-
lum designs or teaching practices contribute to math,
science, and reading achievement? What accounts for
the personal, educational and occupational aspira-
tions of youth? Who is at-risk, who is resilient, and
why? Which family and community supports for educa-
tion matter? Good and critical questions, all.
But scholars with the patience, computing facilities
and modeling skills needed to work with this data
base seem as much interested in their techniques as
in their subjects, and when it comes to tackling educa-
tional issues they gravitate to mathematics, science
and reading because that is what the policy communi-
ty is so keen on nowadays. There is reason to spend
more time in our large-scale queries into educational
achievement on what we can know about the arts and
student development and accomplishment of atl sorts.
This work is a start on this agenda.
10 AMERICANS FOR THE ARTS
ENDNOTES i.TMs research is
based on the National
Educational longitudinal
Study of 1088 (NELS:88),
United States Department
of Education. Office of
Educational Research ami
Improvement This nation-
al study followed about
35.000 students in uoo
diverse schools across the
United States beginning in
8th grade In spring of
1988, with follow-up data
collection in 1990. 1993.
1994 and ongoing. Data
ire based on student sur-
veys, achievement tests.
parent surveys, teacher
surveys and school princi-
pal surveys. This prelimi-
nary analysis is based on
analysis of data for Sth
graders through the loth
grade follow up.
2. Our recent broad review
of research on the arts and
learning, like other
reviews before and since.
turned up a huge imbal-
ance favoring exhortation
and argument for the
importance of the arts as
opposed to good research
designs and defensible
data about student perfor-
mance supporting these
arguments. There are hun-
dreds of small-scale stud-
ies suggesting that various
art forms bring develop-
mental benefits to chil-
dren. See lave T. Darby
and lames S. Catterall. The
Fourth fc The Arts and
Learning. Teachers College
Record. 96/2 (Winter
1994). 299/328.
3. Detailed descriptions of
National Educational
Longitudinal Study of
1988 (MELS:88) variables
used for this analysis and
additional detailed infor-
mation about the methods
used to construct scales of
student arts involvement
are available from the
author. See contact infor-
mation in Footnote 1.
«.H is possible to
"weight- these indicators
of arts-invotvement in
many ways. We chose
assign less weight to
museum-going than to
taking regular arts classes
because of our belief that
regular arts classes proba-
bly suggest more engage-
ment with the arts than
occasional or infrequent
museum attendance. The
data base contains very
limited indicators of fre-
quency or duration for
museum attendance.
5. levels refer to criterion
standards for different
scores on the reading test
Students who demonstrate
specific levels of reading
comprehension are pegged
at specific levels, usually
o, i or 2 for a given grade
level or duster of levels.
What a give level indicates
corresponds to the test
designers agreed stan-
dards for what each level
means and how student
reading is to be scored.
6. National Assessment of
Educational Progress. Art
Technical Report: Exercise
Volume, Report no. ot-A-
10 (Denver: Education
Commission of the States,
1978); also Art and Young
Americans. 1974-79:
Selected Results from the
Second National Art
Assessment, Report no.
lo-A-oi (Denver:
Education Commission of
the States. 1981.
7. See lames S. Catterall.
On the Social Costs of
Dropping Out of School.
The High School Journal
(7l)/l (October-November,
l9«7).«»-3»-
8, Students scoring 2 or
fewer -points- related to
involvement in arts activ-
ities over grades 8 and 10
•re included in the low-
arts group; students scor-
ing more than 7 points
are included in the high-
arts group.
9. This way of framing dif-
ferences is analogous to
the following contrast: If
two groups score 15 per-
cent and 10 percent
respectively on a measure,
there are two ways of
characterizing this differ-
ence: in one representa-
tion, one group is 5 per-
cent ahead of the other;
we call this an increment
In another representation.
the 15 percent group has
outperformed the 10 per-
cent group by 50 percent;
we call this a percentage
difference.
10. Note that a »«J per-
cent share is incrementally
21 percent higher than a
40.7 percent share. See
previous note.
MONOGRAPHS VOLUME1 NUMBER9 11
ABOuramericans for the arts
GOVERNING BOARD
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Fred Lazarus IV
The Maryland Institute,
College of Art
ist Vice Chair
Harriet Sanford
Fulton County Arts
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znd Vice Chair
William Lehr, Jr.
Hershey, Pennsylvania
3rd Vice Chair
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Steinhardt
King County Arts
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/»th Vice Chair
Peter F. Donnelly
Corporate Council
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Public Corporation for
the Arts, Long Beach
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Cravath, Swaine
& Moore
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Franklin, Michigan
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Houston, Texas
Bill Bulick
Regional Arts and
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Donald R. Greene
The Coca-Cola
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Vetv York, New York
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Veiv York, New York
:ull Board
erry Allen
"ity of San Jose Office
if Cultural Affairs
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Arts Council of
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Texas Commission
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BRAVO: the Film
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Field Museum of
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New York University
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Wisconsin Arts Board
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Hickory, North Carolina
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Boothbay Harbor,
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National Bank of
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Freeman/Whitehurst
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Philip Morris
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Garcia & Associates,
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Norfolk, Virginia
Michael Greene
National Academy of
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Mrs. John R. Hall
Ashland, Kentucky
John Haworth
National Museum of
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Betty Jo Hays
Southwest Arkansas
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Eleanor Holtzman
National Executive
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Howard S. Kelberg
Winthrop, Stimson,
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Greenwich, Connecticut
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The Arts & Science
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American Indian
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Lockheed Martin
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California State
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Heinz Endowments
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Allied Arts of Greater
Chattanooga
Sherry Shannon
City of Dallas Office of
Cultural Affairs
Joan Small
City of Chicago
Department of Cultural
Affairs
John Straus
New York, New York
Mrs. Gerald H.Westby
Tulsa, Oklahoma
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Community Cultural Planning: Development and Design to Meet
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