Take Aways

On Monday, everything starts over.

Hello.

In her speech to the delegates, NEA rep Sarah B. Cunningham, the keynote speaker at last week's Face to Face conference, talked and talked. I enjoyed  it awfully, especially the part where she argued for the inclusion of artists in decision-making processes around public policy, education and the use of public space. There was a groovy slideshow and at the end, they let us ask a few questions.

I love the idea that we're important enough to listen to. It's so much better than being ignored. It makes me think that if professional teaching artists were consulted, about the design of all new school buildings for instance--then slop sinks, dance floors, and blackbox theaters with lighting grids would be de rigueur. Future teaching artists would have to spend less time trying to commandeer space, or transform unsuitable spaces into workable arenas for art-making and art-related instruction.

Sarah B. Cunningham is right. We need more simple machines. Like feedback loops within organizations to inform planning.

On the flip side, I think it is fair to say that TAs who demand a voice at the table should have something credible and useful to say.

I have a few more questions:

Shouldn't professional teaching artists be informed on the critical issues?

If we don't understand the mission statement of the organizations we work for, are we really doing our jobs well?

Are we reflective practitioners, or hired guns?

Do we know the state standards, or where to find them? Do we know the guidelines for arts learning for each grade PreK - 12 set by the powers that be? Do we even know who the "powers that be" are, and what they want from us?

Is this just a part-time thing, or are you making a career out of this? I'm just asking, but seriously, is there room in this field for the both of us?

Why is anyone just allowed to call themselves a teaching artist? You can't just call yourself a plumber, or a yoga teacher, can you? Aren't we carrying a skill-set as specific as a plumber, or a yoga teacher? Shouldn't there be rules about this sort of thing? I mean, this has been going on for decades, shouldn't we all have professional memberships with real benefits by now?

Whose fault is it?

What's the profile of a truly professional teaching artist? Is it the painter who shows all the time, or is it the visual art major with an advanced degree in education who has never had work exhibited outside of the university gallery? Is it the actor who's auditioning, or the actor who hasn't done a play in years? If you're not doing your art, can you still call yourself a teaching artist? Isn't teaching  supposed to be part of your art?

Is perpetually juggling six jobs, and never really being able to hold onto health insurance the cost of freedom?

What's the going rate?

Who will find the answers to these questions and put it all in a book?

In Politics: President Barack Obama sits down with the faithful opposition to find a compromise on health care, but the public option is still dead, like so many uninsured.

Plus: Bob Dylan - Positively Fourth Street

School of Everything

Sometimes you need to market yourself. It's that kind of world.

School of Everything is "a social learning network that connects people who can teach with people who want to learn."

I have not tried it yet, have you?

Intrigued.

The company's website is designed to help independent teachers market themselves to prospective students. It has a search engine that matches local teachers with students shopping for an instructor. According to their literature, this clever idea is simply an old-fashioned message board, made new. Search me.

"In the 1960s a group of people set up the Free U in sunny California - it started with blank piece of paper pinned to a notice board asking what people could teach and once subjects were listed and there were enough people signed up to each they ran the courses. Makes sense really doesn't it? We just decided to turn that into a 21st century new fangled website thingy so you can design your own education however you please."

Visit School of Everything to find out more.

President Barack Obama delivered the State of the Union last night and declared it strong. He did not mention teaching artists, but there's always next year.


If this is Friday, this must be Facebook.


Also: Audra McDonald - Stars and the Moon (Songs for a New World)

Soul Searching

Once again, writer/activist Arlene Goldbard explains it all for you.

Ms. Goldbard is, of course, the writer of an impressive series of articles advancing the idea of a "New New Deal" for artists. She is a fierce advocate for positive social change, and her blog on culture, politics and spirituality is a destination point for teaching artists and others in the field.

Ms. Goldbard's latest essay explores the phenomena of disappointment in both political and emotional terms.

I read it, and was amazed, moved and grateful.

See what I mean:

The Disappointment System
by Arlene Goldbard

My friends tend to a few views of President Obama and the Democrats at the end of Year One. They seem different, but actually, all are part of the Disappointment System, my new name for the combination plate of hurt and response which has become our national dish. As is so often the case, what we are as political animals in the wide world is largely due to what we eat in the little world of relationship and emotion.

Read the rest of the essay, after the jump.

TGIF

Today is Friday, which mean's it's all over.

ATA is on Facebook, and I'm kind of on Twitter. Maybe you'll stop by?

The New York Times reports that, after the Democratic Party's historic Senate loss in Massachusetts, President Barack Obama has signaled a willingness to jettison near-universal health care.

Crain's says that New York City's unemployment rate tops the nation's at 10.6%.

Plus: The FREELANCERS UNION offers group insurance rates for freelance teaching artists, and others who want to live.

Cinema: Synecdoche, New York - The Finale

The Results

The Teaching Artist Research Project (TARP) is perhaps the most significant ongoing study of its kind ever conducted, and it's all about us.

At a recent gathering hosted by the National Endowment for the Arts, a few early pieces of data were presented by project director Nick Rabkin, including these:

• 69% of the respondents were women
• The Median age is 44
• Mean income from teaching is about $17,850
• Mean total personal income is about $36,200

The rest of the presentation is posted here.

In the news: President Barack Obama gives a speech announcing that he has decided that more soldiers must be deployed to Afghanistan.

Also: Shirley Bassey - Don't Cry Out Loud

In Performance at the White House

This week, PBS will broadcast In Performance at the White House, a concert hosted by President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama. The show will be on the South Lawn, and performers include: Marc Anthony, Jimmy Smits, Gloria Estefan, José Feliciano, George Lopez, Los Lobos, with Sheila E. as the musical director.

Check local listings and read more about the program at PBS.

Starting tomorrow, you can also view the show online.

New Money

Over at Arts Journal, Richard Kessler reports on U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan's announcement of a $650 million dollar Investing in Innovation Fund.

Bloomberg.com says that "School districts and nonprofit groups would have to team up with private-sector organizations to qualify for $650 million in stimulus grants..."

It appears that the administration of Nobel Peace Prize Winner, President Barack Obama is looking to solve the most intractable problems of our broken school system, once and for all. Mr. Duncan describes the kind of innovators our new leaders are looking to invest in:

"Some will find ways to establish a network of new schools or develop models that turn around low performing schools. Others will find new ways to use technology. Others might explore how to engage children in the arts to help them improve. We want the best ideas to move us forward. We will be investing in great work to scale up existing programs that have already shown success, can validate ones that need to establish evidence of their success or to develop new ideas to determine their potential."

Also: 16-year-old Derrion Albert's beating death was captured on video last week.

And: Eurythmics - I Saved the World Today

Back to School

Summer is over.

Get back to work.

Idealist

NYFA Classified

Also, President Barack Obama has released the text of his back to school speech.

How Things Work

Professional TAs who are eagerly awaiting a new government-sponsored health care plan, should read the New York Times to find out how things actually work.

A White House compromise, being discussed by people who all have excellent doctors, would have government offering its own health plan only if private insurers failed to provide "affordable" coverage. This reasonable sounding alternative is similar to a plan that was instituted in 2003 for prescription drug benefits. In that case, says the Times, "private insurers, seeing a lucrative business opportunity, rushed into the market, and...the Medicare drug benefit is thus delivered entirely by private insurers under contract with the federal government."

If this plan works, people who own insurance companies are going to get so much more rich!

Happy Labor Day.

Also: Capitalism! @ Youtube

Hear the Bells

In the ongoing "debate" over health care reform, people who already have excellent health care are signaling that ditching the public health care option is not a deal-breaker.

“The president is going to continue to try to persuade everyone of the great value of having a true public plan,” said this Democrat, who spoke on condition of anonymity to avoid discussing strategy publicly. ”But at the end of the day, I believe he recognizes that there are other, arguably less effective, ways to achieve greater coverage, more choice, better quality and lower cost in our system.”

Instead of a new government health insurance plan, which is what so many of the public in question thought they were promised, it seems likely that a network of low-cost health care cooperatives will be the proffered solution.


I think they mean group insurance plans like those available through membership in the Freelancers Union/Working Today.


Also: Peter Paul and Mary - If I Had A Hammer

Without a Care

The New York Times reports that health insurance reform has cleared an early committee hurdle. However, some politicians have declared the "public health insurance" option anathema--so, don't get too excited.

First, this:

"If you don’t have health insurance, this bill is for you,” said Senator Christopher J. Dodd, Democrat of Connecticut...It guarantees that you’ll be able to find an insurance plan that works for you, including a public health insurance option if you want it.”

On the other hand:

Republicans on the panel, who voted unanimously against the measure, described the idea of a new public insurance option as a deal-breaker. They said they still hoped that a consensus bill would emerge from the Senate Finance Committee.

Related links:

• New York Times July 14, 2009. The new state budget in Massachusetts eliminates health care coverage for some 30,000 legal immigrants to help close a growing deficit, reversing progress toward universal coverage.

• The Health Care Blog promises "everything you wanted to know about the health care system. But were afraid to ask." No Country for Old Men, an excellent* article by Jeff Goldsmith lays out a case against the public option here. ("Excellent" does not mean you got it right. Sometimes it just means you tried hard.")

• At Real Clear Markets: "the number of uninsured has grown to an estimated 50 million people because of the recession. Even so, advocates in the halls of Congress are rarely the uninsured themselves."

Also: Johnny Cash - 25 Minutes To Go

Don't Hold Your Breath

Friday.

It's all over.

You can relax and hang out with friends.

Also: Over at the New York Times, lawmakers and the White House doggedly pursue President Obama’s top policy goal of extending health coverage to all Americans, sometime in the future.

Plus: Patsy Cline - Crazy

Seek Help

One of my most favorite stops on the tour is the Actors Fund. The organization serves everyone in the entertainment industry; which may include you, or one of a zillion people who are still waiting for healthcare reform to actually arrive.

The Actors Fund maintains the Actors Health Insurance Resource Center. 

Their motto?

Get insured. Get Health Care. Get Creative.

Also: David Bowie - Heroes

The Lights

The LA Times bills its blog Culture Monster as "ALL THE ARTS ALL THE TIME" and they are not messing around.

Headlines, now, even now. include:

A review of a new musical about the super-sized life of musical legend Johnny Cash.

An essay about President Barack Obama and the Arts, including a link to a video of the recent Whitehouse poetry slam.

An article about the ancient and wonderful Merce Cunningham who is busy making plans for his imminent departure.

I love LA.

At the Ballet

On Monday, First Lady Michelle Obama came to New York City to promote the arts.

Here she is being introduced by Caroline Kennedy at the American Ballet Theater Spring Gala.

Mrs. Obama said  that the arts “define who we are as a people.”

Also: Billy Elliot - Possibly NSFW profanity.

The Deal

The New York Times reports that president Barack Obama has nominated Rocco Landesman, the Broadway producer of shows like “Big River,” and “Angels in America,"  as the next chairman  of the National Endowment for the Arts.

“It’s potentially the best news the arts community in the United States has had since the birth of Walt Whitman,” said playwright Tony Kushner. 

When he produced Mel Brook’s show “The Producers," Rocco Landesman introduced the theater-loving public to the $480 “premium” ticket.

 

Also:  The Beatles - A Day in the Life

The Situation

According to the Washington Post, cultural groups have declared a state of emergency:

"I have never seen a situation like this in my 25 years in the business," says Michael M. Kaiser, the president of the Kennedy Center and a veteran arts administrator. After cutting its own budget by 6.5 percent -- a modest trim by current standards -- the Kennedy Center in February started an Arts in Crisis program to counsel troubled organizations. Some 350 have already sought advice."

Also, President Barack Obama holds a live press conference to mark his first 100 days. I do not think he mentioned the arts, but I may have missed it.

The New York Times speculates that the president will appoint a pragmatist to the supreme court. Sure, that's fine with me.

In a long running conversation in the Sunday magazine, the president talks about how his policies might change everything about American life. He touches on nearly everything and manages to argue that "...young people generally are going to benefit from a good, solid liberal-arts education. That’s what I got."

He continues:

"But, again, I think the big challenge that we’ve got on education is making sure that from kindergarten or prekindergarten through your 14th or 15th year of school, or 16th year of school, or 20th year of school, that you are actually learning the kinds of skills that make you competitive and productive in a modern, technological economy.

That’s why I don’t just want to see more college graduates; I also want to specifically see more math and science graduates, I specifically want to see more folks in engineering."

Also: Aimee Mann - Save Me

Wolves

Neil Gaiman's work is brilliant and exciting and he is going to be engaging in a public conversation on May 2, 2009 sponsored by PEN American Center.

When: Saturday, May 2, 2009: 1–2 p.m.
Where: The Great Hall at Cooper Union: 7 East 7th Street
Tickets: $10/$8 PEN Members
http://www.smarttix.com

Neil Gaiman wrote The Wolves in the Walls.

And there were.

Also: The New York Times reports that the private student lending industry and its Congressional allies are "maneuvering to thwart a plan by President Obama to end a subsidized loan program and redirect billions of dollars in bank profits to scholarships for needy students."

The Awful Truth

The New York Times reports that Secretary of Education Arne Duncan has told governors that, in return for stimulus funds, they must submit new school-performance data.

In a “Dear Governor” letter to the 50 states, Mr. Duncan said $44 billion in stimulus money was being made available to states immediately. To qualify for a second phase of financing later this year, however, governors will need to provide reams of detailed educational information. The data is likely to reveal that in many states, tests have been dumbed down so that students score far higher than on tests administered by the federal Department of Education.

Ouch.

Eyes Wide Shut

At the Daily Beast an acidic article by Judith H. Dobrzynski that begins "Memo to President Obama, from the arts world: This is not what we had in mind."

I really couldn't bring myself to read the rest.