The quality and variety of art education taught in grade schools varies greatly across Oregon, with many schools lacking the resources to support a large art program. Corvallis Public Schools seems to be doing better than other districts in the state, but even so, there’s a difference in the art education some students receive versus others in the area.
Art programs in the Philomath School District look very different from those within the Corvallis School District. And when you add schools like Ashbrook Independent School – a private elementary and middle school – into the mix, it raises the question of why some schools make art a higher priority than others.
The Art vs. STEM Question
It comes down to a budget issue. Many public grade schools simply don’t have the money to fund a comprehensive art program – especially with the pressure of needing to raise test scores and graduation rates, devoting more of the limited funding towards language arts and STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) classes.
But improving one doesn’t have to come at the expense of the other. Researchers from the Johns Hopkins School of Education say that teaching actually becomes more effective when paired with creative development.
“Our study provides more evidence that the arts are absolutely needed in schools,” says Mariale Hardiman, the vice dean of academic affairs for the School of Education at Johns Hopkins University. “I hope the findings can assuage concerns that arts-based lessons won’t be as effective in teaching essential skills.”
Corvallis / Philomath High Schools
In the Corvallis School District, each school develops its own master schedule each year, which includes elective classes like art. The schedules are all built differently, depending on the priorities and goals of the school.
Most high schools in Corvallis seem to place a lot of value on their art programs.
Crescent Valley High School, for example, offers 26 different visual arts classes for their upperclassmen. According to their 2021-2022 course catalog, CVHS offers classes in sculpting, digital fine arts, glass arts, jewelry making, ceramics, drawing and painting, and more. All of those subjects have a separate beginning, intermediate, and advanced class – some even offering a professional Career and Technical Education (CTE) option. Freshmen and sophomores are limited to a condensed version of the list of art classes, but still have a variety to choose from.
Similarly, Corvallis High School offers a wide selection of fine art classes, many of which are also CTE classes.
Anna Fidler, who is an art instructor at Oregon State University, frequently visits high schools in the area to talk about the pre-college program she directs through OSU, called JumpstART.
“I am most often impressed with the public-school art programs, though there isn’t a lot of funding from what I hear,” says Fidler.
School districts’ budgets vary across the state. The Corvallis School District, which has 16 schools, including Corvallis Online K-12, had a budget of $330.4 million for the 2021-2022 school year. But just several miles outside of Corvallis, the Philomath School District’s budget looks very different, at $12.5 million to fund their seven schools.
Despite their smaller budget, Philomath High School, for example, has an impressive course catalog, teaching a variety of classes from Healthy Relationships to Botany. But their fine arts selection is limited compared to Corvallis’s high schools. PHS offers six different art classes which mainly focus on ceramics, painting, and drawing – and some of them come with a course fee of $15 or $20.
Grade Schools
While some high schools have more art classes than others, art education at the elementary school level is generally the same across the board.
Fidler has an 11-year-old child who attends a public school in Corvallis.
“She and her friends are not particularly interested in the art curriculum with complaints that it isn’t very engaging or creative,” says Fidler. “I think it’s sad that in elementary schools in Corvallis there are only about 30 minutes per week dedicated to art whereas math, science, [and] verbal skills are an everyday activity.”
At the elementary level within the Corvallis School District, schools only have the budget to fund 40 minutes of art with a licensed art teacher per week. But while classes dedicated specifically to art are limited, the communications coordinator of CSD, Kelly Locey, says the good news is that art is used in lessons daily.
“This can be responding to a book [or] story, using different mediums to complete science projects, or producing art for classroom newsletters – including digital art,” says Locey.
The integration of art in other subjects is important. Researchers say that visual arts can build skills in observation, critical thinking, and communication. It’s even reported that participation in the arts actually raises grades and graduation rates.
Ashbrook Private School
Because of the benefits of an art education, Ashbrook Independent School, a private school in Corvallis, prides itself for considering art as part of their essential curriculum, as they said in a virtual event dedicated to this topic in December of 2021. The event was put together as a response to underfunded and cut art programs, and when asked about specific schools, a panelist mentioned that the CSD’s art programs “took a beating.”
But Locey refutes that claim.
“From the district perspective, we have not made any changes to the staffing allocations that we provide to schools that would influence a reduction in art instruction,” Locey said.
Also, their time allocation for art class doesn’t differ much in public schools from kindergarten to second grade. So where does Ashbrook’s claim that they have a more comprehensive art program come from?
It’s because their third, fourth, and fifth graders get art class every other day – a pretty big difference from public elementary schools in itself, but the art education at the middle school level is where the disparities become more obvious.
Ashbrook middle school students have many more art electives to choose from compared to their public school counterparts – and it makes sense, parents pay more money to have more options. Ashbrook offers art classes that you’d usually see, like painting, ceramics, and drawing, but also often offers classes that you’d never see at any of the other schools in town – including quilting, boat building, rock painting, and even taxidermy. Because Ashbrook is an independent school, teachers can pitch their own ideas for a class and can usually have it be approved as long as it fits in the school schedule.
“By the time the kids graduate from Ashbrook, there really is not any medium that you would find in any normal studio in high school or even college they haven’t tried,” said Ashbrook’s visual art specialist Erik Olsen, who has taught at both public schools in Corvallis and at Ashbrook over his decades-long teaching career.
Where the Money Meets the Road
While Ashbrook’s comprehensive art education is appealing, the price tag to attend the school is not. Annual tuition for Ashbrook students kindergarten through fourth grade is a whopping $11,874, and the cost for fifth through eighth grade is $12,611.
While Ashbrook’s selling point isn’t necessarily their art education, children who attend public school could take a multitude of extracurricular classes for a fraction of those prices, like those offered at The Arts Center.
Finding a comprehensive art program in public elementary and middle schools could be difficult for families in Corvallis, since moving to a different district or paying over $12,000 is unfeasible to most. Until funding is more equitable across the state and the arts are taken more seriously as a tool worth having, it might stay that way for a while.
By Momoko Baker
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