Arts Matter. Education Matters. Kids Matter… But, Not Everywhere In America!
“Children are the future of the nation. If the children are intelligent, the country will be prosperous.” This Thai proverb is echoed in Linda Creed’s lyrics: “I believe that children are our future. Teach them well and let them lead the way. Show them all the beauty they possess inside.”
These inspirational words feel hollow when considering a troubling disconnect between our societal ideals and the nation’s tangible commitment to our children, particularly in the realms of education and the arts ~ the twin pillars of an informed, and flourishing society.
The Promise and Failures of Educational Initiatives
Even the promise of No Child Left Behind, President George W. Bush’s groundbreaking initiative to improve student achievement across public schools, was besieged by failures of fulfillment. The 2002 Elementary and Secondary Education Act aimed for accountability and higher levels of student performance, only to find itself left behind by criticisms about standardized testing, unfunded mandates, and state resistance.
Reports by international bodies like the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and the International Institute for Management Development indicate that the competitive advantage of the United States is faltering due to inadequate investments in human capital, particularly in education. The nation’s low scores, for example, in science and math (16th out of 81 countries in science and 34th in math) means that American students may not be adequately prepared for high-paying jobs in computer science and engineering.
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Separate and unequal
Why, despite widespread acknowledgment of their importance, do we see persistent underfunding of education and the arts and disparities in resource allocation?
One answer lies in the conflicting policy priorities, differing political philosophies, and deficit management that chronically lead to reduced funding at both the federal and state levels.
Another answer focuses on deeper ideological and psychological divides.
One segment of society views comprehensive education as a gateway to critical thinking, innovation, and societal advancement. This perspective has historically driven scientific and technological progress and nurtured the inquisitive minds of our youth. It embodies the belief that children, given the right tools, will shape a prosperous future. It is advanced by organizations that include the National Science Teachers Association, the International STEM Education Association, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the National Education Association.
Conversely, another segment sees the dissemination of knowledge and cultivation of intellect as threats to their traditional values. This fear has historically been manifested in resistance to scientific truths, censorship of artistic expression, and efforts to limit educational content. This worldview seeks to preserve a particular ideological framework, even at the cost of stifling intellectual and cultural growth. It is present today in the agendas of conservative groups like the Heritage Foundation (Project 2025), the National Association of Christian Lawmakers, the American Legislative Exchange Council, and Moms for Liberty.
And then, there is the impact of the dismantling of desegregation plans across the country as a result of rulings by the U.S. Supreme Court. In 1974, in Milliken v. Bradley, the Court held that "a federal court may not impose a multidistrict, area-wide remedy" to desegregate schools). That decision was amplified in the Rehnquist Court’s 1991 decision in Board of Education v. Dowell, ruling that federal desegregation orders could be lifted if school districts had made a “good faith” effort to eliminate past discrimination and had achieved “unitary” status (i.e., had become “sufficiently desegregated). In effect, the decision allowed for the possibility of states to finding new ways to reinstate segregation and further cement systemic racism as an American norm.
Centers of Disinvestment
To be sure, economic challenges, political priorities, and systemic issues have constrained states like Arizona, Nevada, Idaho, Oklahoma, and Mississippi from adequately investing in arts and education funding.
Arizona, for instance, ranks in the lowest percentile for per-pupil funding in the United States. According to a 2022 report from the Education Law Center, a legal advocacy organization dedicated to advancing and protecting public education, the state spends approximately $10,244 per pupil, falling $5,202 short of the $15,446 national average. Arizona provided 37% fewer, and Vermont 76% more, dollars per pupil than the national average. Moreover, the adoption of Arizona’s FY 2025 budget included a $2 million allocation for the Arizona Commission on the Arts ~ a 60% reduction in funding!
In Florida, Governor DeSantis recently zeroed out $32 million in arts grants. And, according to the Education Law Center’s report, Making the Grade, school districts in Florida are suffering an “ongoing underinvestment in K-12 public schools.”
These two states are just the tip of an erosive trend in public school funding. The latest joint report from the Albert Shanker Institute, the University of Miami, and Rutgers University ~ “The Adequacy and Fairness of State School Finance Systems” ~ indicates that “states with large opportunity gaps are essentially inequality factories, with affluent districts funded to achieve higher student outcomes than lower-income districts, year after year.” To wit, African-American students are three times more likely than white students to live in “chronically underfunded” school districts.
A key indicator of the growing gap in educational opportunity and equity is the increase in school closures throughout the country. Declines in urban public school enrollment have occurred, in part, due to demographics (lower birth rates since 2012), the fallout from COVID, and the movement to alternative schooling and charter schools. According to the latest research, “school closures are often inequitable and can disproportionately affect already disadvantaged students: schools with majority-Black student bodies were about three times as likely to close as schools with smaller proportions of Black students.”
One might reasonably see the wave of public school closures as another advance in a decades-long movement to divest and dismantle the “public school” system in the name of school choice. The increasing use of Empowerment Scholarship Accounts ~ currently, in twelve states, including Arizona and Florida ~ diverts funds from public education to private options, further straining resources for public schools.
When viewed against the political backdrop of initiatives like Project 2025 (calling for the elimination of the Department of Education), such moves can be seen as cultural vandalism, undermining the foundational pillars of what should be a robust system of education.
Centers of Investment
All is not lost as a number of states and cities persevere in investing in the future by investing in the arts and education:
Massachusetts consistently ranks high in educational outcomes due to its commitment to early childhood education and teacher development. The World Population Review ranks the state as “the best public school system in the U.S.” with the highest math and reading test scores in the nation.
New Jersey’s additional funding for low-income districts, investments in STEM, and career-technical education are crucial to closing the achievement gap.
Wyoming leverages natural resource revenues for high per-pupil spending, ensuring small class sizes and modern facilities.
Minnesota’s Legacy Amendment allocates sales tax revenue to the arts.
Chicago’s comprehensive Public Schools Arts Education Plan and Seattle’s Creative Advantage initiative are demonstrating the inherent value and impact of integrating arts and education and ensuring equitable access to opportunities for advancement. Likewise, the San Diego Unified School District Visual and Performing Arts Department’s STEAM curricula for third through fifth grades focuses on teaching earth, life, and physical sciences along with dance, theater, and visual art.
Despite Arizona’s national ranking, significant pockets of innovation exist ~ albeit they may still represent challenges to the public school system.
For example, three years ago, House Bill 2862 authorized student-centered education, allowing students to receive the required number of instructional hours through remote instruction, project-based learning, personalized and competency-based learning, or weekend and evening instruction rather than through “seat time” (the formula that generates a full Average Daily Membership funding allotment) in school.
Most notable among the new initiatives is the development of STEM (Science Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) schools and academies.
Arizona State University’s Prep Academy is a “tuition-free public charter school network” for Pre-K to grade 12 learning through “a variety of models, ranging from fully immersive in-person learning to full-time digital programs.” Within this network, ASU’s Preparatory Academy’s Polytechnic Campus hosts the Poly STEM Academy where Pre-K to 8th grade students partner with ASU researchers “to develop real-world solutions, gain hands-on experience, and establish a strong STEM foundation.”
The Amphi School District of Oro Valley operates the Innovation Academy, another K-5 STEM school that integrates the sciences into all aspects of learning with a “hands on” and “minds on” philosophy.
The STEM program of Great Hearts Academy, another network of charter schools in Arizona, involves the study of robotics, coding, math, logic, and science.
Lastly, the Phoenix Elementary School District #1 stands out as a public school whose holistic educational model integrates the arts with science, technology, engineering, and math on the basis that “the arts teach the power of observation, help hone spatial awareness and mathematical concepts, focus on processes that drive innovation and help remove inhibition since there are no wrong answers in art.”
The Path Forward
Notwithstanding these examples of visionary commitments to educational innovation, the fact remains that opportunities for creative and holistic learning are not available to all children and are limited because of systemic discrimination. Too many kids still get short-changed.
It is axiomatic ~ and still bears repeating ~ that inadequately supporting or disinvesting in education and the arts has dire long-term consequences for the well-being of our society. In a highly competitive global environment, performance in these areas becomes a national security issue because it determines our competitive edge. Our future requires the cultivation and development of new generations of critical thinkers, strategists, and innovators.
Reversing the disparities described in this article requires that policymakers recognize that investing in the arts and education is not a luxury but a necessity. At both the state and national levels, we need not only long-term and substantial investments in education and the arts but a transformation of the national mindset.
In effect, we need to shift to a culture that values and emphasizes Cultural Intelligence (CQ) ~ our shared capacity for empathy, curiosity, agility, and the tolerance of ambiguity. Our schools ~ all our schools ~ need to be active venues for cultivating CQ and leveraging the arts for their essential role in enhancing academic performance, critical thinking, and emotional development.
Why? Because kids matter…and, remember…because, they’re our future!
Disgrace on the Empowerment Scholarship Accounts theory, conveniently put in place by republicans who want be able to subvert the public school system by claiming that the costs of education born by taxpayers are transferable private citizens. Shifty mathematics and estimates that do not coalesce into actual costs for educating students have become a daring dance of misplaced priorities. How's that for a cha cha cha? I think the biggest rub comes from the students who are being compensated for their tuition who have never attended public schools. Their numbers are not reflected in projections that are used to justify budgets. I'm getting this information from the AZ Mirror article from 1/30/24 "Arizona school vouchers cost taxpayers more per student but Republicans say they don't". To my reckoning, though, the most egregious disservice caused to the students and taxpayers by the ESA voucher program is the disjointed view of an educated population that results from being able to separate students into disparate learning options. The AZ Department of Education administers a curriculum for public schools that can be bypassed by other educational flavors that only need to adhere to basic guidelines. What a disgrace that a religious view of history or a commonplace understanding of science passes for an educational mandate. What a disgrace that our teachers here in the state of Arizona have to tolerate this nonsense that puts students on unequal footing with each other. And the state budget suffers deficits because of the ESA program. Another reason to vote the republican "politicians" out of office in November. With democrats in the majority in both houses of our state legislature, imagine the changes they could institute with Governor Hobbs' support. Arizona might even see smarter, more secure, and all around better citizens-in-the-making from the students of the 2025 school year.
Very well said Herb. Thank you. America’s advantage has been openness to new ideas and universal public education. Amazing one party seeks to return us to the pre Civil War.