AEP+Forum+Roundtable+10-2-2009

National Expectations for Learning in Arts Education Roundtable Discussion AEP Forum 10-2-2009

Attending: Deb Hansen, Gail Kilkelly, Marcia McCaffrey, Dale Schmid, Nancy Carr, Jamie Kasper, Scot Hockman, Ana Cardona, Frank Phillip, CCSSO, Judith Conk, Asia Society Partnership for Global Learning, Debra Bresman, Communications Consultant, Jeff Hooper, Ohio Arts Council, Mary Palmer, Florida Alliance for Arts Education, Michael Petitz, Educational Theatre Association, Lynn Bratley, Improbable Players, Pedro Sarmiento, Alcala University Spain, Gerri Spilka, OMG Center, May Gwinn, National Dance Association, Sarah Grosvenor, Mott Philanthropic, Kristine Alexander, The California Arts Project, Annie Calkins, Alaska Arts Ed Consortium, Sara Beth Berk, Anderson Ranch Arts Center, Carol Brown, Eastern Suffolk BOCES Arts and NYS Alliance for Arts Education, Liz Rudnick, Massachusetts College of Art and Design, Charlotte Smelser, Texarkana Regional Arts Association, Kim Wheetley, Southeast Center for Education in the Arts, Frank Phillip, CCSSO

The meeting opened with introductions by Gail Kilkelly and Marcia McCaffrey. Deb Hansen, SEADAE president and Frank Philip of CCSSO were recognized. Each attendee was given information on the National Expectations for Learning in Arts Education concept; one on “vision” and one addressing “why”.

Marcia began...

Marcia: I found the last panel interesting because I was thinking about this session. As I was listening I was taking notes and I went back and circled words ...let me start with the vision and I will start with those words. ...we really don't know what exactly is being provided to students in schools today.. How do we know, in your roles, what is happening?

Sara Beth Berk, Anderson Ranch Arts Center: I constantly attend arts shows and go into classrooms.

Marcia: What are you finding out?

SB: There is a lot of duplication.

Marcia: So you are sort of evaluating through anecdotal evidence... how many of you have looked at programs in a way that is similar?

Gerri Spilka, OMG Center: One of the things that we are sort of trying is to really sort of go beyond our current systems. In Philadelphia we did.. principal surveys, partners surveys, school surveys and ...also parents...we are kind of bumping it up from the school level or program level.

Marcia: Or down a level to the student level? What is their level of achievement? Up until know we don't really know how many students, where are the students, what those programs are. We don't really have the tools to find out...to sort of get there.. and we can't get there in a single component.. as the panel spoke to, this is a complex system. It is a system, and if you change one aspect of the system then you have to look at all the components. Some of the things the panel brought up: leadership, policy, students, professional education,..,,, they also brought up proof points- for us the proof points would be the data points.

Marcia continued: Yes we have had standards, we have had standards for a really long time and we have not had the ability to look at them through the perspective of how are we doing...what do we need now to prepare students for college and careers..... Something else on (our visioning) paper – not brought up on the panel- is the state longitudinal data systems; which is the system where school districts are collecting student level data. How can we make sure that the arts are included as the data is collected?

Marcia concluded: So that would be the sort of broad view of this project... believing that it becomes an opportunity for a sort of state led initiative... By no means is this about doing it by ourselves..it is about doing it together. How can we look at the whole system, and that includes community partners.

Gail: It is very important that we look at (all of the partners) ..how can we do it all together?

Deb Hansen: SEADAE has been in existence for five years, truly as this organization matured this idea sort of bubbled up..We know that we are very different in some aspects, but we are also very much alike. The work is so large, that we feel that it is taking a leadership of three (of our members) across the country. SEADAE is meeting on Sunday as a follow up (to this conference) and as you can imagine, a lot of the discussion we will have on Sunday will be around this very issue. We are seeking partners; and if you are interested we would applaud that. Please keep us in mind.

Gerri Spilka, OMG Center: I have a question about what kind of data you are aiming for. When you say “descriptive data” (in the visioning handout) are you looking at actual numbers?

Gail: Yes we are, and one of our partners, Bob Morrison of Quadrant Data Educational Research … one of the conversations we had was about what kind of data do we need as an advocacy tool.. we can't ask everything.

Nancy Carr: We were looking at “killer data points”...if you could only ask 5-6 things across the nation; and with the longitudinal money that's coming up, we can find out for example what grade, what courses, who is taking those courses.

Nancy continued: Then on the teachers; how long are those courses? how many minutes per week? what kind of teacher? are they qualified? The courses... ....These (killer points) would be done annually... because it is required by the feds... then we would have some other that might be a sort of precursor to the NAEP.

Gail: Nancy is right, the State Longitudinal Data is already required...our idea is to use a process that is already there.

Nancy: We are trying to speak to the untested areas.. these are not being tracked in the same way. We want to be included in that same tracking system. It's there, so let's just put this little glitch in there that will sort of allow us to pull this information out.

Marcia: The National Expectations project decided to tackle data first... there's opportunity right now with money... I see both Frank and Micheal wanting to talk

Michael Peitz, Educational Theatre Association: I have a question – this is tangential... any desire to collect information on student access in after school time?

Marcia: I think there are 2 ways- one way is through the state longitudinal data system..the second way is to do a second level of data collection that is implemented more from the arts consultant level. Really learning from what states have been sort of doing in the past... but we've got to have these common data points across the nation … you are somewhat confined with the longitudinal data system and we want to fit into that system.

Lynn: We've been left out (arts) with the data work so far in State Departments of education, so part of this project is that we get to capture that data with this amazing opportunity. Our colleagues in state arts organizations already get data depending on whom they (fund)... we would like to look at how we are going to aggregate this information.. this is that third set.. there is a whole piece that we don't actually collect yet...

Michael: ...there are millions of kids who are involved in extra curricular ..which give them access.

Nancy: With the federal requirements for this longitudinal data it was a perfect opportunity and don't forget these need to be included too, so that we finally can sort of step out from the educational lens, and then we can partner with these others to step up and (address) a sort of global view

Gale: I want to keep you on time, so I wanted to get our representative from CCSSO to talk to us about the EIMAC meeting.

Marcia; Just remember all the conversation we have generated right here, is simply towards that first question; where are we? It's a big piece and sort of cyclical.

Frank Phillip, CCSSO, comments on EIMAC: Education Information Management Advisory Consortium ,. it is a group that is (working towards) a more common (language) to (gather information). It is actually a gathering of 48 state representatives from data collection and assessment. There is a team of about 4-5 people from each state, that gather to talk about this process and make sure everything is going smoothly. On Tuesday they are meeting in Washington and Bob Morrison and I will be addressing them about this particular need. As Marcia indicated, this data has been collected in other areas … Our pleas is going to be “You are collecting data, it is important that you collect data from all of the curriculum areas, because it is important that you do to get a broad picture of education. We are approaching them as a sort of consortium of all of the curriculum data orphans.

Gail: Has the arts ever had a place at EIMAC before these sessions?

Frank: Never. And we are stating that we are a sort of proxy for social studies, physical education and so forth..

Gerri Spilka: So my question is, how do you plan on collecting data across other states?

Frank: Well there is a regular government format to collect this data in other areas and what we want to do is to make sure that the arts are registered as well as these other areas.

Gerri: I am just suggesting that there is a gap in the format of collecting data...

Frank: Absolutely The longitudinal student data system that they are talking about is a brand new process where they hope to gather information on children s' achievement. Up till now when a student moves (from state to state) they have a file, but it is sort of bare bones..it's not consistent. The longitudinal data system would be a process where you can store this information digitally. As you look down the road we are talking about collecting samples of student work..

Gail: Thank you Frank. We all recognize the importance of partnering with other organizations who can bring to the table the skills we don't have and we are very grateful to all of our partners, (named all of our partners) If you look at the sheet that begins “National Expectations” you will see at the bottom six points that we see are very important to this idea..we don't want to narrow our approach.... We've begun with data because we know that is where we are extremely weak. Please take bus time, evening time, break time, as a networking opportunity. Give us your thoughts your ideas .. these are very important to us.

The meeting closed at this point with a brief informal sidebar discussion about Ed Steps initiated by a comment from Frank Phillip with comments from Judy Conk of the Asia Society asking for dialogue with SEADAE. Deb Hansen will follow up. It was noted that Gail Kilkelly and Dale Schmid are on the Creativity group connected with Ed Steps.

Respectfully submitted Cory Wilkerson Project Manager