Art Education in Schools: The Current Landscape

The art education landscape in America today is an interesting place. There seems to be a perception among educators, parents, and art professionals, that art education in schools is under attack. Field trips seem to be disappearing from schools, as well. The National Endowment for the Arts seems to be always facing budget cuts. Given that climate, it may seem like children being exposed to art is not a priority anymore. And you may be asking yourself, is that really so bad? As long as kids are learning how to read and perform basic addition, maybe it doesn’t matter that they’re not learning music or finger painting.

The purpose of this site is to explain the arts education/outreach situation as it really is: where the successes and failures are, how we can fix what isn’t working, and, most importantly, why art is critical for people of all ages and how it can revitalize and even create communities. This post is the first of a series that will show the current art education situation in schools, museums, parents, and communities.

First, let’s discuss schools. What are the facts about art in schools and how many days do schools have a year dedicated to field trips? Field trip days have decreased in recent years; “a study from the University of Arkansas documents the decline the American field trip: A 30 percent decrease in student attendance at Cincinnati arts organizations between 2002 and 2007, a similar decline in the number of students visiting Chicago’s Field Museum, and an American Association of School Administrators survey showing more than half of American schools eliminated planned field trips in the 2010-2011 school year.¹” No field trips means no trips to museums or other art spaces.

Art education in schools is a slightly more hopeful topic. Looking at this graph², you can see that the majority of schools still offer a form of art education. There is a discrepancy in what kind of art is offered, but most children are getting access to art in public school. This is hopeful; access to dance and drama could be improved, but the situation is not as dire on the whole as we might believe.

However, the picture changes when we look at it socio-economically. This graph³ sheds light on a different story. Firstly, we see that just because a school may offer visual art or music, that doesn’t mean that children are taking advantage of those programs. Then, and much more importantly, we see that art education differs greatly depending on race and ethnicity. The conclusion we can draw from these two graphs is that it’s not enough to just provide access to art in schools.

As I mentioned before, this series will just provide the current situation of art education in various arenas of society. Other posts will delve more deeply into how we can fix the problems and why it matters at all.

1. Ryan, Julia. “Study: Students Really Do Learn Stuff on Field Trips.” The Atlantic, September 16, 2013.
2. Americans for the Arts, 2012-14
3. Americans for the Arts, 2011