Arts Advocacy

It concerns me that a common observation is that art education tends to provide benefits that aren’t likely to be valued in a test-centered curriculum, cannot be easily be studied, and are difficult to demonstrate quantitively. It’s as though we can come to an understanding that these benefits exist and are beneficial to lifelong learning and problem solving, but the focus always comes back around to how it can be expressed in scientific proof and hard figures. I can understand how this sentiment arises in a world where educational funding is limited, and our government views education as a means of preparing the population to enter a globally competitive workforce.

It would seem to me that this emphasis of education as a utility of our economy is flawed, and that arts advocacy would benefit less from trying to prove that art is worth the economic investment and more from restructuring how we view the purpose of education. As Constance Bumgarner Gee talks about the very real importance of ‘workforce readiness’ being thrust on education in terms of national security, it leads me to question whether our economy is held back by the quality of our workforce’s skills or by the quality of their character. In order to face threats like a pandemic or global warming, are we held back by our number of engineers and scientists, or are we held back by the capacity for our population to be self-critical, to make lifestyle changes, and to accept solutions that break the status-quo. The answer to this question is political and divisive, but I think it cuts to the heart of why art (as well as other creative and liberal studies) can be tricky to advocate for in the current climate.

Until this view of education shifts, I worry that art education and advocacy will continue to be forced to adhere to the metrics of economic viability and test-driven results to which the art’s strengths of ‘visual-spatial abilities, reflection, self-criticism, and willingness to experiment and learn from mistakes’ (Winner and Hetland) are not immediately well suited for.