Music to their ears — New push for arts education in New Orleans

22nd September 2014
By George White, Contributing Writer
(Special from New America Media) — In the years following Hurricane Katrina, a rigorous back-to-basics education reform movement all but eliminated music instruction in New Orleans’ primary schools – an irony considering the city’s status as the cradle of jazz.

But this fall, music classes appear to be making a comeback.

It’s not yet a surge; but if some educators, city officials, community activists and parents have their way, it soon will be. They’re calling on schools to provide more arts-integrated instruction as educators this fall begin to operate under the new Common Core standards.

Instruction in harmonic tones as well as team-work is now being offered at two New Orleans elementary schools. Homer A. Plessy Community School and Arise Academy began to offer music instruction this fall, just one year after the arts-infused Young Audiences charter school opened.

Enrollment is another indicator of growing interest. Encore Academy, an arts-integrated elementary school that opened in 2012, has seen enrollment quadruple from 100 to 400. Young Aud­iences opened in 2013 with 400 students and now has more than 500 students.

“The response from families has been tremendous,” says Young Audiences Principal Folwell Dun­bar. “People in this city are craving for what we’re trying to do. We have a long waiting list for every grade.

“All children, especially at a young age, need a well rounded education. You don’t teach arts in isolation and you don’t study math in isolation of other subjects … We’re striving to connect arts across grade levels and (academic) subjects.”


The connection between arts instruction and academic achievement, already well documented, just received another research-based endorsement. The Kennedy Center recently released results from a study that examined the impact of arts education on hundreds of fourth and fifth graders among 32 schools across five school districts in the Metro D.C. area.
read more: http://www.louisianaweekly.com/music-to-their-ears-new-push-for-arts-education-in-new-orleans/