stand up for the arts

In today's Sun Times:

ARTFUL ACTION: Ravinia's CEO, Welz Kauffman, has been tapped to lead a team of Illinois decision makers at a multistate Education Leadership Institute organized by the National Endowment for the Arts.

The July 26-28 conference seeks to create strategies to strengthen arts education. ''As the son of two teachers, I think of myself as a lifelong student,'' says Kauffman, who hopes they will shape a new ''generation of leaders who won't have to apologize for the arts, but can embrace them as part of every day.''

Not to get all soap-boxy about this, but I think we need more leaders like Welz who will stand up for the arts. When I was in school, all the way from K-8,I had an art class as part of the curriculum (it was called "CASH" - computers, art, shop and home economics). We also had music class, I think every day. We learned the composers, we learned about different kinds of music, we went on field trips to the Art Institute, the CSO and Lyric Opera, as well as the Field Museum and the Museum of Science and Industry. It was part of my life, it was the rule and not the exception. When has it started to become the exception??? And why does it have to be this way??

There is a perception out there about arts education - that it's not as important as the three Rs. Not true. I was not athletic. Gym class was awful. I found my place in school by being in choir (and on the choir board in high school - woot!) and I know that's true for so many people.

So many of our arts organizations have community engagement (a fancy name for outreach) programs in the community to bring music, dance and opera back into classrooms. I know that Ravinia has started a youth orchestra, modeled on El Sistema, the Venezuelean music education system that fostered the talents of conductor Gustavo Dudamel.

Joffrey has a great dance program for middle school kids, using dance to teach them respect, team work and self confidence. I attended the spring concert where all of the kids came together (about 400 kids from 22 schools) to show off the choreography that they created. It was dances from the 1960s and it was so much fun to watch.

I hope that the July conference is successful - I only wonder why this information was buried in Bill Zwecker's column???