Arts Budgeting
When I was in seventh grade, I was fortunate enough to land the lead in the school play, a dream I had held since I was little.
Unfortunately, the production wasn’t as dream-worthy as I had imagined. Due to a lack of effort the school put into the show, the production was given very little to work with. We had to use the stage in the cafeteria, which was particularly noisy when people were walking in and out to buy food. We had one set, a cardboard fireplace, which failed to provide a colorful illusion. The budget the school put towards the show paled in comparison to the budget the soccer team got. They were able to go all over the county going to games, while we were stuck in a noisy cafeteria rehearsing for a low-budget show with teachers who knew nothing about theatre.
What bothered me the most was when school representatives are asked what they want to improve most about the school they would always respond “sports,” as if sports programs don’t already have enough money. More money, time and effort should be put towards school art programs for people like me. In a study done by USA Today, statistics show that students involved in the arts do better in academic subjects than students who are not involved. Being an artist helps you academically in school. Schools want students to do the best they possibly can in academic subjects. Therefore by putting more money into arts programs, involved students just may turn that “B” into an “A.
” Creativity is a vital skill for life. Almost everyone likes to dream, and the arts support that one-hundred percent. According to the Wall Street Journal, imagination is absolutely needed for cognitive development. It helps students decipher between fantasy and reality, as well as help them think “outside the box.” They are imaginative and imagination gives people new ideas.
The arts help imagination stay alive and that is something our society needs in order to function properly. Creativity helps us to think and learn. In fact, it is a very important for a leader to be creative. The website “FastCompany” polled 1, 500 CEOS and sixty-percent of them said that creativity was the most important quality for a leader to have. Art also helps students to communicate. By writing a story or dancing, the arts let people share feelings that they otherwise can’t express.
They take us deeper into thought and even let us discover things about ourselves that we already might not have known. According to MaryAnn Kohl, author of the book “The Importance of Art in a Child’s Development,” involvement in the arts helps a child’s problem solving skills because “…instead of following specific rules or directions, the child’s brain becomes engaged in the discovery of “how” and “why.”” Arts involvement will help children figure things out on their own, and being able to solve a problem is clearly a skill needed in order to achieve their goals in life. There needs to be more support of the arts in schools, and more time, money, and effort put into to making arts programs successful. The arts help imagination and creativity to grow, develop problem-solving skills, communication, and even improve a student’s academic performance. Art can open up another side of life, and as a wise person once said, “Without ART, eARTh is just ‘eh’.”
