LAUSD decision ushers in new source of funding for arts education
Los Angeles Unified School District officials have cleared the way for principals to tap into a major source of funding for arts programs targeting low-income students starting this fall.
Although state and federal officials previously said national Title I dollars, allocated to help disadvantaged students improve in academics, could be used for the arts instruction, some district officials had been reluctant to move ahead. The latest decision reverses the district's long-standing practice and opens the door for Title I-funded arts instruction that helps students improve their academic performance.
"This has been a long time coming and this really is a day of rejoicing, quite frankly, in LAUSD," said Rory Pullens, the district's executive director of arts education.
A two-page memo issued Thursday from Pullens, Deputy Superintendent Ruth Perez and Karen Ryback, executive director of Federal and State Education Programs, confirms the arts as a core subject and allows schools with high percentages of low-income students to use Title I funds for the arts.
Those schools "may utilize arts as an integration strategy to improve academic achievement," the directive reads. However, Title I funds are not allowed "to fund programs whose primary objective is arts education," according to the memo. As an example, the funds could be tapped to help students learn a character's point of view in a lesson that requires acting out a skit.
Title I funding, developed in 1965 as part of President Lyndon Johnson's war on poverty, has been used historically to increase students success in reading and math. The funds have paid for efforts like reading coaches or math tutors, supplemental software programs and professional development for teachers to improve low-performing students' test scores.
At $14 billion a year, the Title I funds make up the federal government's largest expenditure for grades K-12. The majority of LAUSD schools receive Title I dollars.
Arts advocates have long sought to get the second-largest district in the country to shift its stance on Title I arts funding, arguing that the arts have been shown in research to boost student academic performance.
LAUSD joins just a handful of districts around the state that have committed to a district-wide Title I plan including the arts. San Diego Unified, Sacramento City Unified and Chula Vista Elementary School District are among them, according to Joe Landon, executive director of the California Alliance for Arts Education.
Landon says beyond these districts, the decision to use Title I for the arts is largely playing out on a school-by-school basis. Some principals are using Title I funds for the arts, but they're doing so largely under the radar, some fearing that state monitors will say the funds were used incorrectly.
"At each level, there are people that are afraid," Landon said. The reason: schools are accountable for how Title I dollars are spent and misuse could cause schools to lose a valuable funding source. Despite the state and federal directives on Title I allowing arts instruction in academics, school officials have been hesitant to make LAUSD decision ushers in new source of funding for arts education | 89.3 KPCC:
