Arts Education

Grantmakers in the Arts holds arts education as one of its core funding focus areas. GIA is committed to invigorate funding and support for arts education within federal policy and defend that every resident has access to the arts as part of a well-rounded, life-long education. In 2012, GIA formed the Arts Education Funders Coalition (AEFC), an interest group within GIA, to address identified needs in comprehensive arts education and to strengthen communication and networking among arts education funders. Advised by a committee of Coalition members, GIA engaged the services of Washington, DC-based Penn Hill Group, a firm with education policy expertise and experience working with diverse education groups to research, develop, and promote educational policy strategies.

Most recently, GIA worked with Representative Suzanne Bonamici (D-OR) on the development of the Arts Education for All Act, the broadest arts education policy bill ever introduced in Congress.

In Spring 2021, GIA influenced the U.S. Department of Education to highlight the importance of equitable access to arts and culture to the process of reopening schools and to make explicit how racialized this access was prior to the pandemic and that addressing this inequity is essential to effective reopening.

Grantmakers in the Arts is delighted that in 2020 Congress passed the Supporting Older Americans Act, including our recommendations that the Administration on Aging include the arts in the issues to be identified and addressed and be included among supportive services for older Americans.

GIA has successfully lobbied to include arts-related provisions in the Child Care for Working Families Act, which proposes to better help low-income families pay for childcare and expand high-quality state preschool options.

GIA is extremely proud of our work over the past several years on raising the visibility of the arts in the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) in its legislative form. GIA and Penn Hill Group continue these advocacy efforts around the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), guiding GIA members and their grantees in advocating for new or expanded arts programs at their local schools and districts.

April 11, 2022 by Jaime Sharp

President Biden paid a rare visit to Marín Elementary School in North Philadelphia, a program that received funding from the American Rescue Plan. ArtistYear teaching artist fellow Coco Allred reflected on her experience of having the American leader come to the classroom.

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April 5, 2022 by Nadia Elokdah

"For decades, arts and music education in California has been dying a slow death in many schools, strangled by budget cuts amid an ongoing emphasis on core subjects like reading and math and test scores as the measure of student success," reports Louis Freedberg in EdSource.

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October 29, 2021 by Carmen Graciela Díaz

Frances Phillips reviews research about an arts education program the Walter & Elise Haas Foundation participated in over the past year responding to the idea of Emily Garvie from the Clarence E. Heller Charitable Foundation "of organizing arts nonprofits to lead subsidized pods for students who lacked access to consistent arts learning and schoolwork support."

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October 7, 2021 by Steve

The Arts Education for All Act is the broadest arts education policy bill ever introduced in Congress, and is currently working its way through the legislative process. Grantmakers in the Arts, in partnership with Americans for the Arts and National Association of Music Merchants, invites you to join us in formally supporting this legislation. You can learn more about the bill here, and submit this form to express support.

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July 26, 2021 by Carmen Graciela Díaz

In a recent opinion piece, Misty Copeland, Wynton Marsalis, Jody Gottfried Arnhold, and Russell Granet make a case for the transformational power of arts education.

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May 6, 2021 by admin

On Thursday, March 11, President Joe Biden signed the American Rescue Plan (ARP) Act of 2021, a $1.9 trillion package in response to the COVID-19 crisis. Of the more than $122 billion allocated for K-12 schools, at least 90 percent of funds are required to be used by State Education Agencies (SEAs) to make subgrants to Local Educational Agencies (LEAs). Under the bill, SEAs and LEAs are required to allocate a significant percentage of funding towards evidence-based interventions – such as summer learning or summer enrichment, extended day, comprehensive after school programs, or extended school year programs – that address the social, emotional, and academic needs of students, particularly those disproportionately impacted by the pandemic.

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April 28, 2021 by Carmen Graciela Díaz

The Posse Foundation has launched a new arts initiative, to connect students who are focused on arts and culture from cities across the country to top arts-oriented colleges and universities, in partnership with Lin-Manuel Miranda and the Miranda Family Fund, with CalArts as institutional partner.

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April 12, 2021 by admin

GIA recently sent a letter to Education Secretary Miguel Cardona to urge the Department of Education to include in its Volume 2 Roadmap to Reopening handbook guidance further clarifying the importance of providing access to the arts for low-income children and children of color with the same quality and rigor as their more advantaged peers.

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March 1, 2021 by Carmen Graciela Díaz

A post by Jamie Hipp and Margaret-Mary Sulentic Dowell, in collaboration with the Arts Education Partnership Higher Education Working Group, says "offering arts integration coursework for preservice teachers can embolden elementary teachers to embed the arts into the crowded curriculum, leading to benefits for students and teachers alike."

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