Dennis Baker

Earlier this month, I used my cellphone to interview Dennis Baker; a teaching artist, entrepreneur and social media expert. We had a wide-ranging conversation and here are the results. Dennis has kindly typed and edited the interview. It's good stuff.

Q: Hi Dennis! I am so glad you've agreed to answer a few easy questions. It's February 2nd, and I am in San Francisco. You are based in Los Angeles. We are doing this by phone, and since my cellphone bill is ludicrously high and I am underpaid,  I'll get right to it.

(Here we pause because an incredibly loud protest demonstration of California State Workers passes by banging drums and screaming something about draconian budget cuts. It will be over soon.)

Q: Dennis, what are the critical issues facing Teaching Artists?

Dennis Baker: Money is always a critical issue.  This is going to get some people upset, but I am going to say it, teaching artists are the migrant workers of the arts education field. Administration justifies paying $25/hour for a teaching artist with a masters degree in education, with no benefits, because they think that teaching artists choose to be freelance workers. Teaching artists are freelance workers, because there is no other choice. If there was a full time resident teaching artist position created, with the benefits and pay of an administrator, the teaching artist application pool would be huge. In the U.S., we live in a society where the goal is to get everything as cheap as possible, without truly asking what that means to the people that we pay the lowest price. This mindset does not account for the whole picture. I am not implying that every arts education organization chooses not to pay their teaching artists a living wage, but the standards are not at a sustainable level.

I think the issues that actors have with the amount of work, in relation to pay, is the same problem for teaching artists. In the acting field, there has been questions of why is there so many MFA programs, graduating actors year after year, for a field that can not sustain the numbers.  Some of the statistics are:

·      14.4% of Equity members (actors and stage managers) work in any given week in ’08-‘09

·      49.3% of Equity members are unemployed for the whole year of ’08-‘09

·      Median AEA member made $7,688 in ‘08-‘09

My guess is that these numbers are pretty close to the teaching artist field. We are seeing more and more schools creating theater education programs, for a field in which a teaching artist cannot make a living wage.  Why? One reason, higher education institutions are businesses. If there are enough students willing to pay for it, they will create a degree, with no consideration of whether there is a field to sustain their graduates. Manifest destiny is at the bedrock of all we do.  Grow and expand, without thinking of the consequences. Does any theater program advertise the above statistics? No, because their might be less student enrollment. So until we are willing to have a national conversation regarding the relation of higher education to the number of jobs in the field, there will be an ever-increasing supply and demand problem. Is the answer a union? That is a good start to increase standardized pay, but that will not address the amount of work in the field.

            Regarding pedagogical issues, how can we find ways to integrate the education of becoming a teaching artist with that of the classroom teacher?  Do teaching artists need to take some classes in a credential program?  As I begin to teach theater education and teaching artistry, I find that I am lacking in truly understanding the mindset of the classroom teacher.  While I know the basics through working with teachers in the past, and looking at state standards, in general teaching artists do not know the language of classroom teachers and principals.

Q: What is the future field for professional Teaching Artistry? Where are we and where are we going?

Dennis Baker: There is no doubt that the field has come into its own in the last decade. The field and conversation has grown. It is a time to truly reflect and find ways to move forward in a sustainable manner. Sustainability needs to be the future of the field.  We are not there yet. We are pockets of people without a unified voice. We live in a time where business and entertainment is looked in higher regard than education. For sustainability to occur, this national mindset will need to shift.  Without this national shift, we are a field that is fighting for scraps at the table.  Honestly, I am talking of a change that is beyond any of our life times, if it is to happen at all. In the mean time, one needs to be a creative, entrepreneurial teaching artist. 

Q: Dennis, I see you working all over the place. You're on Twitter. You're an actor, teaching artist, fight director, audition coach, web designer, and social media expert. Aren't you exhausted? I mean, how are you pulling all of this off?

A: Individuals in business are learning what it is like to live and work with less, something artists have always done. At the same time the entrepreneur discussion that is going on in the business sector is something artists need to be listening to and figuring ways to adapt it to the teaching artist field.  Artists can learn just as much from people like Gary Vaynerchuk, Seth Godin and Guy Kawasaki as they could from leaders in the education field.  While living in New York, and planning to move back to Los Angeles, I was talking to a fellow teaching artist expressing my concern that Los Angeles did not have the same infrastructure for work in the theater arts education.  He said, well then you will have to create your own. What keeps me positive is that we as humans are adaptable. How are we as teaching artists creating our own work? How are we forging relationships with teachers, principals, school districts and organizations to create opportunities for work?  We need more of these conversations in the field. Coming out of graduate school, I was hired into a one of the biggest theater education organizations in New York.  There I formed my teaching artistry, but due to the size, all the business aspects was taken care of for me. I just had to show up for the various curriculum trainings, give them my availability, and they would email me with jobs. That is not the norm. So how do we become entrepreneurial teaching artists?

First, what do you do exactly? You might say I am a teaching artist. Too broad. What is your niche, your specialty? What are the two to three things that you are good at teaching? Shakespeare? Physical Theater? Elementary age children? In the area where you live and work, you need to be considered the expert in areas of your specialty. This is where living outside a metropolis might help you. It takes more work for me to be considered an expert in a theater or acting field in Los Angeles then it would for a teaching artist working in a field that is less populated with theater artists.

Second, do people know you are an expert in that field? This is where connection is key. Are you in conversation through social media, attendance at school district functions, PTA meetings, etc. You need to be at the places where you can make connections with people that would want to hire you. Principals, teachers, parents need to know you exist.  Are you reading the mommy blogs, and commenting on posts in regards to education? Are you at the school district meetings?  Are you using social media, not as a tool to talk, but as a tool to listen?  So many people say I don’t get twitter, what am I supposed to say.  Don’t say anything, just listen.  Listen to the conversation that is being held on the local level, as well as the national level.

Third, create a need that then you can fill.  Businesses are great at this.  They sell us a product that we don’t even know we need, and once we do, they are there to provide us with it.  Everyone agrees that education is important and needed, but what does that mean?  How can you go about influencing hearts and minds in your local community that the work of a teaching artist is needed? There is numerous articles that show how arts education is needed, but minds are not changed with statistics, they are changed through experience.  How can you provide administrators, teachers, parents and students with an experience in where they have an “a ha” moment and realize that teaching artist work is needed in their school, community organization and community?

Lastly, in this current time you will not make a living wage as a teaching artist. While you need to find your niche within the teaching artist field, you need to diversify your job skill set. You need to find other part-time freelance jobs that will compliment your teaching artist work.

......................................

Here, all conversation ended because those last few sentences from Dennis nearly killed me. I encourage you to read it again to yourself, slowly, carefully and aloud.

Thank you Dennis Baker for your thoughtful comments on the state of the field. Fellow teaching artists, if you would like to join this ongoing conversation, push the comment button below or email us here.

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

What Did You Learn?

Teaching Artists on the subway may have noticed that a recent advertising campaign for the School of Visual Arts Continuing Education program profiles its faculty with full-color portraits; photos captioned with a surprising slogan that reads "I Teach and I Do."

Validation.

I was so shocked, I missed my station stop.

Also: SVA CE has a cool blog.

A song to teach someone: Pete Seeger - What Did You Learn in School?

We Do the Work

On ATA's Yahoo Forum, a member mentions A Teaching Artist at Work by Barbara McKean.

It's a terrific book. For example, in an excerpt posted on ATA's website, the author gives some useful background and context for the term Teaching Artist:

"The term teaching artist first appeared in the 1970s through the work at the Lincoln Center Institute and its arts education programs. I began working in classrooms and in education programs with professional theatres, the term artist-in-residence or artist-teacher was used to set us apart from the arts specialists employed by school districts or artists who did not participate in teaching. Today teaching artist has be come the term to used to describe the wide range of activities for those individuals who both practice their art form and engage in teaching others the knowledge and processes they employ as artists.

Teaching artists are distinguished from those who dedicate most of their time to teaching the arts in schools and are licensed teachers and from master-teachers who share specific knowledge and techniques from their won work in a limited workshop-type environment.

Teaching artists in education are expected to work as artists as well as invest themselves in the creation and implementation of project in collaboration with other teachers or education staff. The modifier—teaching—highlights the pedagogical nature of the work. It helps the individual conceive of teaching as the activity that modifies and drives the education approach of the art form."

From Barbara McKean, A Teaching Artist At Work: Theater with Young People In Educational Settings, Heinemann, 2006.

Finally, it is Friday and ATA is on Facebook. That's 800 teaching artists who have information, knowledge and resources for teaching artists.

Share.

Also: The People In Your Neighborhood - Sesame Street

I Feel Real

Sometimes, after an in-class workshop, an adult in the school will come over and say something astounding like "Wow, you guys were great with those kids. What's your real job?"

Just smile, and wonder who it is they think they're talking to.

Also: From The Reflective Practitioner by Donald Schön:

"In each case, the practitioner gives an artistic performance. He responds to the complexity, which confuses the student, in what seems like a simple, spontaneous way. His artistry is evident in his selective management of large amounts of information, his ability to spin out long lines of invention and inference, and his capacity to hold several ways of looking at things at once without disrupting the flow of inquiry." (page 130)

Plus: Ms. Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta - Poker Face

How To Do That

Most professional teaching artists are freelancers. If a TA is lucky and has a lot of clients, this can mean a considerable amount of time in the field, and little time to manage the flood of paperwork and emails that are the millstones of success. Over at her excellent blog Minutiae & Flux, professional teaching artist, and colleague, Carla Ching posts on this very topic.

Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity is a book by David Allen, but the GTD Cheat Sheet @ LifeDev.net summarizes the book in a page or two, because who has time?

Over at Unlocking the Classroom, professional teaching artist Lizzie Hetzer writes on Freire, bell hooks, Radical Love and Buddhism, all of which can make time management issues seem like background noise.

In the News: The Teaching Artist Union has meetings, and the deadline for proposals to the Common Ground Arts Education Conference is fast approaching, which means it is today.

Unemployment hovers at just above 10%. Make those dollars before the winter break! Luckily, many jobs are posted on the Yahoo Listserv, courtesy of ATA Executive Director, Dale Davis.

Finally: Consider Disco. KC & the Sunshine Band - I'm Your Boogie Man

A Light On

Teaching Art in Alternative Settings in N.Y. is a teaching artist resource guide developed by professional teaching artist Phoebe Zinman Winters. I have read it, and I can honestly state that this might be the most thrilling Power Point presentation I'm going to experience for awhile.

In 18 brisk slides, Ms. Zinman Winters nimbly manages to describe just what you've gotten yourself into, and provides skillful insights on a wide range of important topics, like:

• What kinds of jobs exist?

• How to find jobs?

• What to do with your jobs?

• Creating a Teaching Artist Community

Ms. Zinman Winters' presentation is posted here. It is accompanied by a useful handout, and the sense that working as a teaching artist is awesome, fun and only occasionally difficult.

A must read.

Also: The Book of Right On - Joanna Newsom and her magic harp.

A Holiday Message From ATA Executive Director, Dale Davis

A Holiday Message From ATA Executive Director, Dale Davis

On Friday, November 20 the National Endowment for the Arts presented a live webcast on http://www.arts.gov of a forum about America's artists and other cultural workers who are part of this country's real economy. Academics, foundation professionals, and service organization representatives came together to discuss improving the collection and reporting of statistics about arts and cultural workers, and to develop future research agendas and approaches. The agenda http://arts.endow.gov/news/news09/cultural-workforce-forum.html

The Archive will be available on arts.gov this week.

Today Ian D. Moss blogged on Fractured Atlas on the NEA Cultural Workforce Forum:

"The format was more academic research conference than industry gathering; each of the three “panels” actually consisted of a 10-minute presentation from each participant followed by a Q&A period at the end. The primary discussion took place among the invited researchers and several other guests granted spaces at a very large U-shaped table setup, but Sunil Iyengar, who ran the show for the NEA,made sure to solicit regular questions from the 30-40 onlookers aswell. The panelists hailed from a mix of academic institutions and nonprofit organizations of various types, though curiously only one, Ann Markusen, was from west of the Mississippi (and she made it byless than a mile)."

He highlighted some facts, including:

"We also had Nick Rabkin talking about his research on teaching artists. Quoting Eric Booth, he said that teaching artists are “experts in the verbs of art” - the process, rather than the product.

His survey showed that:

50% of teaching artists had a master’s degree or higher, and a majority worked for nonprofit arts organizations. Half of respondents had over a decade of experience. The median compensation was $35/hr, but the number of paid hours was not that high.

Median total personal income was $36,200, while the median income from teaching was just $17,850. 20% had no health benefits. On the other hand, they love teaching and see it as a calling."

When we take a close look at all the above, what is the message Teaching Artists are receiving? I would love to hear from you on this?

ATA's survey Teaching Artists and Their Work http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=F_2bJJwetasGgrnMZUcqQ99g_3d_3d clearly demonstrates Teaching Artists know what is necessary for the work of Teaching Artists to become sustainable. If you have not taken the survey, please do.

How many roads must Teaching Artists walk down http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DFvkhzkS4bw

Happy Thanksgiving!

Dale Davis
Executive Director
The Association of Teaching Artists

ddavis@teachingartists.com

Save the People

Yesterday, card-waving members of the Teaching Artist Union gathered for the regular monthly membership meeting and open-house, which is held on the 3rd Sunday of each month at the Teaching Artist Union Hall at 1079 Grand Avenue in Brooklyn.

TAU's co-founder, Cassie Thornton, presented the organization's beta mission statement, which reads, in part:

"The Teaching Artist Union is composed of New York City artists who teach as a part of their creative practice. With this union, we aim to define the role of the teaching artist through developing a supportive community, celebrating and exhibiting the work produced in teaching situations, and advocating for the rights and needs of the teaching artist."

TAU membership is free for artists who teach.

Hey, that's you!

Also: Laura Nyro - Save the Country

Beautiful Things

At some point, you wanted to create art, or we wouldn't be having this conversation.

New Residencies at The FAR Space: Applications due Friday, November 13

Field Artist Residency
❀ 45+ hours of rehearsal space
✿ One individual consultation

Emerging Artist Residency
❀ 65+ hours of rehearsal space
✿ Creative and career workshops
❀ Performance at The Kitchen

Guidelines & Application Form

Also: Community Arts Network promotes information exchange, research and critical dialogue within the field of community-based art.


And: What is a Teaching Artist?

Finally: What is a budget?

Twenty One

Sometimes, I have twenty questions. For instance, how is a TA supposed to live on 5 part-time after-school gigs in 3 different boroughs that each pay $50/hour twice a week when the train costs $90 month and the average one bedroom is $2500, and you can't be in two places at once? What do you think when you hear the phrase "planning time is included?" If we're supposed to be both good artists and effective teachers, do we need two advanced degrees? If so, shouldn't the hourly rate be higher? Whose lesson plan is this? Which ones are the solid earning years for a TA? Where are the mentoring programs? What happens to all the older TAs? I know you are there, but weren't there more of you? Did your colleagues all become administrators, advocates and philosophers in residence? Or, did they just all quit and get real jobs? Are they eating? Can they pay their bills? Can you? Why does everyone keep asking me to volunteer?

Also: Alice Russell - Seven Nation Army

The New School

The New York Times says a free, unaccredited, art school has opened in Manhattan.

It may be true, but what does it mean?

I really couldn't tell you.

All I can decipher is that the Bruce High Quality Foundation is starting their own school and you are invited. They say interesting things on their website, such as: "we aspire to invest the experience of public space with wonder..."

Right on.

Also: Jay-Z w/ Alicia Keys - Empire State of Mind (MTV)

The Reasons That We Live

It's going to be quite a week around here. It's all about professionalization, again, because we are focused on it. We seek improvement in the situation.

Please, complete the newest ATA survey.

Also, two versions of the same song, by the magnificent, and late, Minnie Ripperton.

Reasons (Live on Soul Train w/ an interview.)

Reasons (album)

Reasons

In 2007, Judith Tannenbaum posted an excellent entry on Arts Blog about the ongoing professionalization of the Teaching Artist:

That’s the question I’d like now to ponder: What do we teaching artists, students, program administrators, site partners, community activists cherish about the work of art in other places, as Bill Cleveland calls it, as it has been practiced over the decades? What do we want not to lose as teaching artistry becomes a more formal field?

If you ever feel like you need to talk about these things, ATA is on Facebook, and everyone is on Twitter:

http://twitter.com/carlaching

http://twitter.com/JoanneLeeJacobs

http://twitter.com/ediedemas

http://twitter.com/JohnAbodeely

http://twitter.com/dennisbaker

http://twitter.com/DanielPink

http://twitter.com/teachingartist

Certifiable

There is a big conversation about Teaching Artists and certification taking place at Dewey21C.

This issue raises so many questions.

Most of mine are about money.

I read that Studio in a School has this training program where you can get credentialed through Pratt.

The Long Term Program has a credential component that visual artists can take part in. It is an intensive art teacher certification program designed to establish well-trained, licensed art teachers in New York City public schools. STUDIO IN A SCHOOL (STUDIO) selects professional artists, who are committed to teaching children, to participate in this partially-sponsored certification program. Artists accepted into this component fulfill all of the employment requirements of the Long Term Program during the two-year full-time Phase One, PLUS complete all certification requirements through Pratt Institute’s graduate Program in Art & Design.

What you will receive:

• Full-time salaried employment with health insurance

• All training and a portion of the tuition for education credits required for certification (as per Pratt Institute) will be paid for by STUDIO IN A SCHOOL

• Mentoring and training for the art teaching residency by established STUDIO IN A

SCHOOL artists

• Two full years to work side-by-side in the art studio with classroom teachers;

planning together to ensure that a strong art program is integrated with other

curricular goals, and gradually developing the classroom management skills

required for teaching independently

Also: Barbra - Everybody Says Don't

Something To Talk About

As you may recall, the University of Chicago Survey Lab is carrying out a large scale survey of teaching artists in specific cities. The Teaching Artist Research Project (TARP) is supposed to "deepen our understanding of the lives and work of teaching artists" in order to inform policy-makers.

In a recent email reminder, TARP says:

Despite all of the interest generated by the Teaching Artist Research Project, we have heard from surprisingly few of you. We know that teaching artists lead hectic lives, but we keep encouraging you to take our survey about your work for very good reasons. TARP will help us understand your perspective on how to shape new strategies to expand arts education and train teaching artists so that they work best for artists. So, please give us fifteen minutes of your time now..."

The study sites are Chicago, Boston, Seattle, Providence, and eight California communities.

Did you answer?

Outnumbered

Did you know that teaching artists "greatly outnumber licensed school-based arts specialists" in New York City Public Schools?

It's a fact.

If you sign up for Arts Watch, you can get news like that every week.

I followed a link to Broadway World and there was the story:

The New York City Arts in Education Roundtable, an arts education service organization, today released results from two surveys, both attesting to the enormous contribution the city's cultural organizations make to arts teaching and learning in the city's schools.

The Roundtable's annual Impact Survey reveals that in aggregate New York's arts organizations spent more than 15% of their budgets on educational programs and raised tens of millions of dollars in 2007-08 for education programs in New York City public schools.

Also: The Honeymooners @ Youtube

Apply Yourself

Over at Fractured Atlas' Blog, a helpful list of do's and don'ts for job applicants may actually help you avoid common pitfalls.

The list is inspired by actual, embarrassing, events.

The Professional

On June 19, 2009, The Dana Foundation hosted a symposium on the web around defining the Teaching Artists profession.

Artists in the Classrooms: What is the role of the Teaching Artist? has been archived and can now be viewed in its entirety by clicking here.

Also: Marianne Faithfull - Working Class Hero (Caveat viewer: Twice, she cusses like a working class hero.)

Flow

Since you are a professional TA, you may relate when I reveal that I am usually carrying around a slew of dog-eared books in my satchel. This week, my subway companion is a classic by the remarkable Donal Schön. 

The Reflective Practioner: How Professionals Think in Action.

I think it's changing me.

Here's a quote from a speech Mr. Schön gave in 1987:

First of all, there’s the view that what we know is a product. There is a body of knowledge. It is a set of results which are, at best, the results of research carried out in the universities. It’s knowledge that is determinate in the sense that there are right answers: questions have right answers. It’s the business of the teachers to know what the right answers are and to communicate them to students. The knowledge is formal and categorical; it is explicitly formulable in propositions that assign properties to objects or express in verbal or symbolic terms the relations of objects and properties to one another. And let me tell you a story: the Russian cognitive psychologist, Vygotsky, who worked just after the Russian Revolution, worked with peasants, some of whom had been to the collective schools and some of whom had not. And he gave them little tests. And the basic pattern of the test was "Put together the things that go together." So he showed this peasant a hammer, a saw, a hatchet and a log of wood, and he said, "Put together the things that go together." And the peasant said, "Well, clearly, what goes together is the log of wood and the hatchet and the saw because you use the hatchet and the saw to cut the wood for firewood." And Vygotsky said--and this was his regular strategem--"I have a friend who says that the saw, the hammer and the hatchet go together because they are tools." And the peasant answered, "Then your friend must have a lot of firewood!