Kids bob like small boats around Carrie Fonder as she tries to navigate the halls of Detroit's Edison Elementary School. "Miss Carrie!" they call, tugging on her sleeve. "Are we coming to art class today?" Fonder isn't a Detroit Public Schools teacher. She's a visiting artist whose salary is paid by a nonprofit group.
In that regard, Edison's 375 children are luckier than they know. Only 40 percent, or 69, of the 172 DPS schools have an art teacher, down from 80 percent 10 years ago. And just 30 percent of Detroit schools -- the engines that powered Motown -- offer music instruction.
Detroit's public schools have been in crisis mode for far more than a decade. But suburban schools may not be far behind. In October, all public schools suffered a $165 per pupil cut in state aid -- some suburbs lost even more -- leaving even wealthy-by-comparison systems contemplating cuts to programs once regarded as indispensable.
Student achievement in core subjects like English and math gets tested yearly under the federal No Child Left Behind Act and Michigan Educational Assessment Program exams, to which state aid is tied. So when budgets shrink, art or music -- which are not tested -- are often the easiest to drop.
"The pressure to improve math and reading scores is so great that the fear response has been to get rid of everything else," said Ana Luisa Cardona, a fine arts curriculum consultant at the Michigan Department of Education. "So administrators eliminate the arts, even though research tells us they help engage a student and turn an entire school around."
Fine arts decimated
From The Detroit News: http://www.detnews.com/article/20100222/SCHOOLS/2220332/1026/Arts-lose-out-in-Metro-school-cuts#ixzz0gGr84gI9