Arts Education Policy Review

Bimonthly, 40 pages per issue. Heldref Publications, 1319 18th Street, N.W., Washington DC 20036-1802. Subscriptions: 1-800-365-9753, $47 individuals, $89 institutions

Reviewed here: Volume 103, Number 6; Volume 104, Numbers 1 and 2 (July/August, September/October, & November/December 2002)

A slim yet meaty journal, Arts Education Policy Review addresses multiple dimensions of arts education including: programs for students of all ages; teaching in general education settings as well as in art academies or conservatories; teacher preparation and assessment; student preparation for careers in commercial as well as "fine" arts; curriculum development and curricular theories; and a humanities symposium on art and the history of ideas. Some articles explicitly address the topic of policy, while others grapple with content in which policy is implied.

Based on a reading of three recent issues, I found that most comprise three feature articles, one or two book reviews, and a "Symposium: Arts Education from Past to Present," addressing the role of art and art education in society in different historical periods through the work of philosophers, historians, or artists. For example, the September /October Symposium of materials written and compiled by V.A. Howard, is based on the Letters of poet, play- wright, critic, and philosopher Frederich Schiller (1759-1805), an artist who was awarded a pension by a Danish prince on the sole stipulation that "...he be mindful of his health and continue to reflect on the human condition.” Howard notes that Schiller was “...one of the first to challenge the notion of the arts as imitative. Rather he sees them as constructions, as ways of shaping experience and perception (and us as individuals). A direct line of influence traces to John Dewey and his notion of the arts as “recon- structions” of experience and at the core of any education deserving of the name....” Schiller is best known for writing the Ode an die Freude (Ode to Joy), associated with Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, and for writings on the interaction between aesthetic experience and the moral life. Do artistic and aesthetic development lead to improved moral vision? Is a period of great art also a time of great political and social advances? According to Howard, in Schiller, “The relations between the aesthetic and the moral are never fixed.”

A rich thread that may be followed through recent issues of the Review analyzes the preparation and retention of music and art teachers. In the November/December 2002 issue, Timothy S. Brophy outlines recommen- dations for improving the preparation of all beginning teachers. His findings were first introduced in a 1972 report published by the Ohio Commission on Public School Personnel Policies. The Ohio report recommended more opportunities for student teachers to interact with children during the course of their credentialing programs. Brophy finds that the problems outlined in the Ohio report persist today. In the same issue, “Beginning Music Teacher Induction and Mentor Policies” (by Colleen Conway, Patti Krueger, Mitchell Robinson, Paul Haack, and Michael V. Smith) identifies the importance of strong induction programs for beginning teachers, and the important role that mentoring by master teachers in one's own school and from one's own discipline appears to play in supporting new teachers. Music teachers face particular challenges in finding appropriate mentors, as many of them are the only teachers of music or art in their schools or buildings and find limited value in mentoring by teachers from other disciplines: “...a novice often finds that the strategies that work in a typical desk-lined classroom do not completely transfer to the challenges of a studio or rehearsal classroom.” Conway and her co-authors compare funding, structures, and policies for teacher induction programs both in general and as they relate to music instruction in Connecticut, Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota, and Washington. Clifford K. Madsen and Carl B. Hancock's “Support for Music Education,” in the September/October 2002 issue reports on results of a survey distributed to a randomly selected sample of 225 certified teachers who obtained bachelor of music education degrees during the past ten years. Those producing the survey were concerned about teacher attrition and sought insight into the situations of teachers who stay in the field. Results were analyzed in the context of patterns of attrition for all kinds of teachers. Music teachers who stayed in the field perceived a high level of administrative support for their work but were challenged and often demoralized by different understandings of the importance of music education and a perception that music should be an extracurricular activity. Many felt isolated in their professions.

Another recent highlight is Samuel Hope's, reasoned “Policy Frameworks, Research, and K-12 Schooling” in the July/August issue. Hope demonstrates ways that interlocking policies may undermine one another's impacts, even when they share purposes and values; and he outlines research questions that would advance arts education policy research. A wide-ranging piece requiring slow, attentive reading, this essay is worth the effort. Hope's confident, persuasive tone sheds a clear light on complex material.

Potentially controversial, Harold M. Best's “Lemonade or Merlot? Authentic Multiculturalism and High Culture” traces the diverse threads in the author's own music education and advocates strongly for “classical [Western] art music” as the most challenging and worthwhile tradition of inquiry. Best's position in an educational environment that increasingly seeks to engage with pluralism, may seem politically incorrect, but his passion for difficulty and the highly personal voice he brings to his subject are winning: There is still a kind of gravitational pull on my mind and my spirit—something that grounds itself in the deeper structures of existence itself—that demands of music immense intellectual, aesthetic and architectural prowess. For this I am very thankful.

While many of the authors publishing in Arts Education Policy Review are academic scholars, the journal is accessible to readers with a general interest in the subject. The Review's scope — from the training of professional artists to curriculum for public elementary schools — recommend it to an array of arts grantmakers.

Frances Phillips, Walter and Elise Haas Fund