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In Spring 2005, the DC Collaborative launched the Arts Education Initiative (AEI), a multifaceted pilot project to establish a District-wide Arts Education Plan that includes arts experiences, arts learning, and arts integration. The DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities and the Ford Foundation serve as our foudning and primary partners for the AEI, and provide generous funding for this endeavor. Through a comprehensive partnership with several DC public and chartered public schools, over the past three years (2005-2008) the DC Collaborative has developed, piloted, refined, and adopted a model process for collaboration in an urban school setting, to effect school change and enhance student learning. AEI enables collaborators, classroom teachers, school arts specialists, teaching artists, and cultural organizations' to plan, lead, and evaluate each partner school's arts education programming more effectively. As a result, all schools in volved in the AEI have greater access to equitable, high-quality arts education opportunities that support local learning standards and curriculum objectives. To achieve these goals, the DC Collaborative is focusing on three major areas:
Communications: Part of the AEI's succeess is its ability to inform the public of the value of arts education. Community roundtables and advocacy efforts have helped the DC Collaborative and its members raise awareness of arts education activities and garner new support for arts education as an integral part of learning in DC's public and chartered schools.
Arts Education Standards and Planning: In 2004, DC Public Schools administration tasked the DC Collaborative with developing a comprehensive Arts Education Plan for the District school system. Our preliminary report, submitted in January 2005, included a timeline and objectives. Today, as new city and education leaders work to reshape the future of public education in Washington, DC, the DC Collaborative and its members continue to serve as collaborators, advisors, and partners in this transformation. In May 2008, due in great part to the efforts of DC Collaborative members, partners and educators, DC's State Board of Education unanimously approved new Arts Education Learning Standards for the District of Columbia. This milestone represents an important step forward in our efforts to work with the city to establish a City-wide Arts Education Plan. We anticipate that the final plan will span the DC Collaborative's established arts education continuum: ensuring that all DC public and chartered public school students have access to arts experiences, arts learning, and arts integration.
DC's Arts Education Learning Standards are available for public review.
The establishment of new standards in the arts represents a quantum leap forward for public education in Washington, DC. The DC Collaborative encourages all members, teachers, teaching artists and arts educators to begin using these newly adopted standards, so that we can ensure that DC students have access to best practice and knowledge in the field.
School Partnerships: During the 2008-2009 school year, the DC Collaborative continues to implemement its model for school reform using arts integration, increasing students' opportunities for arts experiences and creative learning. The eight DC public and chartered public schools that participated in the pilot initiative will continue to partner with us as we transition from pilot project to full-fledged program. Five to seven new DC public and chartered public schools are being added to the AEI this school year. New funders, such as the Capitol Hill Community Foundation, have joined the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities and the Ford Foundation as major supporters of the AEI's expansion. Ongoing, independent, external program evaluation and assessment, conducted by Dr. Robert Horowitz from Teacher's College at Columbia University, serves as a guide for program reflection, improvement and expansion.
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