Taken from
A PORTRAIT OF PERSUASIVE POTENTIAL
The Evaluation Study of ArtsNow: 2007–2008

Prepared by
David E. Myers, Ph.D.
Professor and Director, School of Music
University of Minnesota
Minneapolis, MN

November 12, 2008

CASE STUDY SCHOOLS

What is the quality of implementation of ArtsNow in selected schools implementing the model of arts leadership teams and in-school creativity workshops?  What successes and challenges are associated with implementation? 

Four schools that evidenced consistent coherence with the principles and strategies of ArtsNow were selected for site visits.  The visits consisted of interviews with administrators and teachers, classroom observations, and reviews of student work.

MARY LIN ELEMENTARY SCHOOL (ATLANTA PUBLIC SCHOOLS)

Mary Lin Elementary School enrolls 520 students. Thirty-two percent are non-white and 18 percent are eligible for free or reduced lunch. CRCT scores are consistently very strong (percent of students meeting and exceeding standards generally in the 90s) and the school has met its annual Adequate Yearly Progress standards. The arts leadership team includes an art teacher, a music teacher, the principal, a teacher each from grades 1, 2, and 4, and the physical education teacher. Representatives from the school have attended two Foundational Trainings. After the first Foundational Training, the team met and conducted an in-service on arts integration during a staff meeting.

Lin Elementary has been a designated Discipline-Based Arts Education (DBAE) school for a number of years. Annenberg-Getty funding associated with DBAE has provided funds for professional development in arts integration. Team members believe that ArtsNow has "reinvigorated" the school around arts integration, particularly for newer teachers who were not educated in DBAE strategies. The principal is strongly supportive of both specialist arts content and integration of arts across the curriculum. After the first ArtsNow in-service, the leadership team offered several more after-school workshops. Unfortunately, no one attended. The team members therefore began doing arts integration collaboration among themselves. The leadership team does not have "formal meetings," but the members all implement arts integration within their own programs.

Lin does not have an Arts Time because they do not believe an arts emphasis should be limited to one hour. Instead, the principal and other members of the leadership team want to convey the message that arts integration should be continuous. An example of a successful collaboration occurred during the third-grade study of ancient Greek gods and goddesses. Using knowledge of the gods and goddesses and visual art, children created a "live" sculpture garden in which different children each represented a god or goddess. In addition, they created paper mache busts of the gods and goddesses. The classroom teachers were responsible for ensuring consistency of content with Georgia and APS standards, and the visual art teacher guided the sculpture creations. 

At Lin, classroom educators generally take the lead on arts integration, consulting with specialists for particular assistance. The music specialist has made a special effort to incorporate language arts concepts into music classes by composing songs.

Members of the leadership team feel that Lin Elementary has a "culture of arts integration" that made ArtsNow work relatively easily for them. However, the transfer from the attendees at the workshop to the entire school has been a challenge given the many initiatives the school must deal with. The curriculum is organized around 4 themes per year, which encourages integration of content and concepts. The leadership team feels that attending ArtsNow Foundational Training should be a priority for all educators and administrators. As with many schools, Lin lacks the formal collaborative planning time that would aid implementation of ArtsNow principles and strategies. Though the school has established planning times, the focus is typically on academic priorities that must be addressed relative to testing; as a result, it is difficult to spend time developing arts integration ideas. The fact that creativity workshops had to be proposed as after-school activities without incentives or rewards made it impossible to transfer the workshop knowledge to more educators in a substantive way.

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