Mayor Rahm Emanuel is known for his love of the arts. But not for children in Chicago Public Schools.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact:
Wendy Katten, 773-704-0336
Raise Your Hand Survey Reveals Arts Instruction Sorely Lacking in CPS
65% of reporting schools do not offer two hours of weekly arts instruction, as stated by Mayor Emanuel
CHICAGO, February 20, 2014 — In a recent survey regarding arts instruction at Chicago Public Schools, education advocacy group, Raise Your Hand found the majority of schools are not able to offer two hours of arts instruction per week, contrary to publicly stated support for this by Mayor Emanuel.
The web-based survey, conducted in January and February 2014 includes responses from parents and teachers representing 170, or nearly one-third of CPS. The survey found other grave inequities in exposure to arts instruction across Chicago. Of 170 schools represented in the survey:
· 14% have no arts instruction
· 51% have less than two hours of arts instruction per week
· 26% have two hours of art instruction
· 9% have more than two hours of arts instruction
· 31% saw a decline in arts instruction this year.
“CPS has an arts plan that supports increased arts instruction but a per pupil funding allocation that barely covers the most basic fundamentals let alone robust arts programming,” said Wendy Katten, Director of Raise Your Hand. “If CPS truly wants all children in Chicago to be exposed to a rich arts curriculum as they state, they will need to increase the per pupil funding rate to allow for this.”
The CPS Arts plan states: “the case for the arts is clear. We know that arts education strongly correlates to substantially better student engagement, academic performance, test scores and college attendance, along with significantly decreased dropout rates and behavior problems. And we know that the correlations are strongest for low-income students…Even more, there is growing recognition that the arts contribute to essential 21st century skills like innovation, creativity, and critical thinking.”
Parent Sherise McDaniel of Manierre Elementary said, “My third grader doesn’t have one art or music class. We were thrilled when our school was taken off the closing list last year but our school has seen significant budget cuts and we lost our art teacher. I wish my son had two hours of art per week, or even one. We also lost our librarian due to budget cuts.”
According to survey responses, many parents are paying out of their own pockets for arts instruction at their children’s schools.
Parent Colleen Dillon from Burr Elementary said, “In order to stretch our budget this year, not only were we forced to have a split classroom for the first time, but we also lost our art teacher. Now, the only arts classes offered at Burr are parent-funded and the amount we can fund certainly does not equal two hours a week.”
In the comment section of the survey, many respondents shared frustration at current school budgets, which have been cut to the bone and do not allow for any kind of shift in priorities.
LSC member Jennifer Gierat of Byrne Elementary said, “At Byrne, we do not offer and have never offered two hours of art per week. And we will never be able to offer two hours of art per week under the current budget. The students receive 45-60 minutes of art per week depending on the grade level, and they receive no music instruction. We have one wonderful art teacher doing a fantastic job. The mayor’s claim that our school is providing more than that in this broken system is a distortion.”
About the survey:
Raise Your Hand conducted a non-scientific, web-based survey during the month of January and February. The survey data is based on responses from 444 people representing 170 CPS elementary schools across the city.
RYH asked its members to report the amount of arts instruction received at their school and members called or emailed other schools for information. Responses were aggregated based on information provided by 170 schools. Schools that did not reply are not included in the analysis. When confronted with contradictory reports on the amount of arts instruction at a single school the higher estimate was used in the data analysis. Therefore, any errors are likely to over-state the amount of arts education rather than under-state it.
About Raise Your Hand for Illinois Public Education: Raise Your Hand is a growing coalition of Chicago and Illinois public school parents, teachers and concerned citizens advocating for equitable and sustainable education funding, quality programs and instruction for all students and an increased parent voice in policy-making around education. http://www.ilraiseyourhand.org.
Amy Smolensky
amysmolensky@comcast.net
312-485-0053
Diane Ravitch's blog 
At least Rahm’s children will not be suffering from a lack of arts facilities and education. http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2014-02-25/site/ct-uc-lab-school-arts-confidential-0225-biz–20140225_1_mellody-hobson-ariel-investments-chicago-laboratory-schools
Oh the hypocrisy!
LikeLike
Rahm Emanuel studied dance as an undergraduate.
LikeLike
Sad.
LikeLike
Yes, the arts matter a lot.
All the more reason why public schools should have, within broad federal, state and local rules & guidelines, the power to use funds allocated for the students they serve. They also should have the power contract for some services from other groups (or do the work themselves) rather than rely on the central office, IF they want any of these powers/responsibilities.
The Boston (district) Pilot Schools program offers a great model for empowering educators and families within a district.
Finally, for those who’d enjoy a 2 minute celebration of arts & young people, here’s a you-tube video.
LikeLike
http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2014-02-23/news/ct-charter-closed-school-met-20140224_1_cps-schools-andrew-broy-cps-ceo-barbara-byrd-bennett
On the subject of broken promises, this looks like a big problem for the mayor:
“A charter school’s efforts to win support to take over the building of a school closed by Chicago Public Schools last year was instantly criticized by a community leader, illustrating one hurdle the district faces as it tries to find new uses for shuttered facilities.
The growing charter movement is one logical use for the 43 recently vacated CPS school buildings, but the district promised during the painful process of closing schools last year that it would not allow privately run charters into the buildings.”
The mayor and his schools chief famously promised that they wouldn’t privatize the public schools they closed, but I’m wondering, can the state charter board trump that and put the charters in anyway?
“Andrew Broy, president of the Illinois Network of Charter Schools, says he predicted at the time that blocking charters from taking over the schools was impractical.
“I think adapted reuse of these buildings is important because we don’t need more boarded up buildings in some of these communities,” Broy said. “The most obvious use for these buildings is a school, and charters should be part of that discussion.”
Why would the mayor and his CEO make a promise they can’t keep?
LikeLike
Perhaps because they never intended to keep it.
LikeLike
If the Illinois state charter board trumps Chicago, the mayor and his CEO are going to have a difficult time explaining how they didn’t know that when they made the promise.
Credibility is pretty important, and one can’t get it back once it’s lost. Making all kinds of promises you can’t keep to ram your program through almost always backfires.
What was her plan? To rely on some careful legal parsing of words, where CPS ITSELF didn’t privatize the schools? No one will buy that, nor should they.
LikeLike
Here’s an embarrassingly deferential interview in Esquire with the mayor. It’s basically a long campaign ad. They didn’t ask him any questions, so you won’t learn anything, but I thought the incredibly negative tone towards public schools and the promotion of charter schools was fairly typical for both national media and the mayor:
“Like Daley before him, Rahm likes to talk about charter schools—private schools, basically, that sidestep the teachers union, cutting expenses, eliminating bloat, drawing in corporate funding. ”
Apparently public schools are for photo ops and charter schools are, as one Ohio newspaper calls them “the darlings” of ambitious pols and ambitious media people both 🙂
http://www.esquire.com/features/rahm-emanuel-interview-0314
LikeLike
“…charter schools—private schools, basically,….”
Calling Joe Nathan. Calling MS.
LikeLike
Is this even “education” at all when a significant portion of that which makes up human knowledge is left out of the curriculum?
LikeLike
The arts education situation in Chicago is even worse than what’s reported here. There is a new “unfunded mandate” that all high schools offer visual arts, music, theater and dance whether or not they have they facilities for it, and more significantly, whether or not they have the teachers and space in their schedule for doing all 4 disciplines. The effect of this on schools with thriving, high functioning arts programs will be devastating in a number of ways. Since students have limited space in their schedules and are required to take a certain number of arts classes, programming them into the extra classes and having those classes be full will be a logistical nightmare. in schools with great programs in some but not all of the disciplines, the addition of more choices will dilute and generally diminish the excellence they have slowly built up over the years. It will lead to arts programming that is an inch deep and a mile wide, rather than the deep and focused curriculum’s that many schools now enjoy. It ignores the fact that many schools without all 4 disciplines never the less have strong student involvement in the “missing” ones through extra curricular activities and after school clubs. And, as alluded to at the beginning, with the per pupil funding scam now in place, there will be no money for the extra teachers needed to run the additional programs in space the schools do not have. While those trying to put this in place do have the best of intentions, they ignore the reality that this one size fits all mandate will cause great harm to existing high quality programs that are part of the positive culture and personality of so many of our schools. Yet another brain dead solution to a non existent problem from CPS. Did they engage teh teachers who are already running arts programs in the schools to get their feedback on the best way to ramp the arts up across CPS? I doubt it.
LikeLike
It must also be acknowledged that the appropriate people are aware of this conundrum and may be working on a solution. Time will tell.
LikeLike
More of the reform movement’s dumbing down of America. Narrow and shallow standards for your lowly child but only the best for their child. Disgusting.
LikeLike