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The Value of an Arts Education

Stephen Owens, Interim PresidentBoard of CuratorsOctober 21, 2011

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Missouri Artists

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UMKC Alumni in the Arts…

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John Adams on Art Education

‘I must study politics and war, that my sons may have the liberty to study mathematics and philosophy, natural history and naval architecture, in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, tapestry and porcelain.’

─ President John Adams

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America’s Heritage in the Arts

‘Art is a nation’s most precious heritage. For it is in our works of art that we reveal to ourselves and to others the inner vision which guides us as a nation. And where there is no vision, the people perish.’

–President Lyndon Johnson, on creating the

National Endowment for the Arts

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Can You Identify This Verse?

‘Musa, mihi causas memora, quo numine laeso, quidve dolens, regina deum tot volvere casus insignem pietate virum, tot adire laboresimpulerit. Tantaene animis caelestibus irae?’

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Muse, tell me the cause: how was she offended in her divinity, how was she grieved, the Queen of Heaven, to drive a man, noted for virtue, to endure such dangers, to face so many trials? Can there be such anger in the minds of the gods?

From the First Chapter of Virgil’s Aeneid

‘Musa, mihi causas memora, quo numine laeso, quidve dolens, regina deum tot volvere casus insignem pietate virum, tot adire laboresimpulerit. Tantaene animis caelestibus irae?’

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Enhancing Science Education with Liberal Arts Programs

Dartmouth President Kim:

› Narrowly focused technological programs have produced good physicians and scientists

› Now saying: ‘People just aren’t as creative as they need to be if we’re going to compete in the world economy’

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Education and the Arts

Involvement in the arts is associated with gains in math, reading, cognitive ability, critical thinking and verbal skill. Arts learning can also improve motivation, concentration, confidence and teamwork.

─ Edutopia, The George Lucas Foundation

The art experience ‘can connect people more deeply to the world and open them to new ways of seeing.’

─ The Rand Corporation

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Music Classes and SAT Performance

An analysis conducted of multiple studies confirms the finding that students who take music classes in high school are more likely to score higher on standardized mathematics tests such as the SAT. One explanation is musical training in rhythm emphasizes proportion, patterns and ratios expressed as mathematical relations.

Critical Links: Learning in the Arts and Student Achievement and Social Development, 2002

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Harvard Study on Visual Arts Education

Researchers from the Harvard Graduate School of Education found visual arts classes have broad indirect benefits.

‘Students who study the arts seriously are taught to see better, to envision, to persist, to be playful and learn from mistakes, to make critical judgments and justify such judgments,’ the authors Helen Winner and Lois Hetland concluded.

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Guggenheim Study: Learning Through Art”

» Students score higher in 3 of 6 problem-solving skills defined by the study:

› Flexibility› Connection of ends and aims› Resource recognition

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Guggenheim Study

» ‘…we are pleased to demonstrate that arts education helps develop the skills necessary to persistently and adaptively work through problems.’

» ‘By asking students to think like artists, we are imparting 21st-century skills by encouraging them to approach problems with creativity and analytic thought rather than just recitation of facts.’

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Education in the Arts is Important

» to the arts themselves

» to understanding history

» to intellectual development

» to creativity

» to problem solving

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Draft Policy on Academic Freedom

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Bloch School Gaining National Momentum

» Undergrad and grad programs in entrepreneurial studies ranked well within top 25 in U.S., according to Princeton Review

» Henry Bloch’s transformative investment in School