President's Committee On The Arts And The Humanities - Ed

“Change will not come if we wait for some other person orsome other time.”—President Barack ObamaAs part of this engagement effort, the President’sCommittee showcased extraordinary principals,superintendents, and organizations working inarts education in a White House Champions of ChangeArts Education roundtable. Led by Committee Vice ChairMary Schmidt Campbell, then Dean of New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, the roundtable of educators and advocates showcased exemplary arts educationprograms raising academic performance in low incomeschools. The White House Domestic Policy Council andthe U.S. Department of Education participated and informed this discussion. The report, along with the Committee’s outreach efforts, revealed its new arts educationstrategy: leveraging the arts to support transformation inAmerica’s highest needs schools.Results from Reinvesting in Arts Education: Winning America’s Future Through Creative Schools positioned the artsas a tool in broader education reform. To demonstratethis premise, the Committee launched Turnaround Arts.The approach would be provide in depth, arts-basedtransformation to a cohort of the nation’s most strugglingschools—middle and elementary schools in the bottom 5% performing in their state. These schools, eachin “turnaround” status, would teach all classes throughthe arts, provide artist engagements in the schools, andensure all students received arts education classes. In2012, the curtain was raised on a pilot program in 8selected schools.Many esteemed artists volunteer as Turnaround Artists to engageindividual schools, bringing new hope and possibility to each.Paula AbdulTrombone ShortyMarc AnthonyDJ IZElizabeth BanksJoshua BellDavid BlaineDavid BrooksJackson BrowneChuck CloseMisty CopelandAutumn de ForestCameron DiazCarla Dirlikov CanalesSilk Road EnsembleJesse Tyler FergusonJane FondaPaula FugaFrank GehryCitizen CopeJosh GrobanHerbie HancockTaylor HawkinsDavid HockneyValerie JuneElton JohnWhoopi GoldbergJack JohnsonRashida JonesMic JordanBarbara KrugerNigel LythgoeYo-Yo MaKerry James MarshallLarisa MartinezDave MatthewsIrvin MayfieldThom MayneKeb’ Mo’Jason MrazGraham NashJohnny NuñezEdward NortonSarah Jessica ParkerKal PennUsherTracy ReeseLil BuckTim RobbinsSmokey RobinsonDoc ShawJake ShimabukuroRussell SimmonsChad SmithEsperanza SpaldingJacqueline SuskinKerry WashingtonForest WhitakerBernie WilliamsDamian WoetzelAlfre WoodardJohn Lloyd YoungLedisi

creative writing, and music in all theirclasses. Science class students madeup stories about superheroes basedon the periodic table. At the end ofthe year all the schools were required to do a stage performance, forsome it was the first school play.Schools received art suppliesfrom Crayola, musical instruments from the National Association of Music Merchants (NAMM)and artist mentors who would take aspecial interest in their school. President’s Committee member artistswere deployed to Portland, Oregon;Bridgeport, Connecticut; Lame Deer,Montana; Des Moines, Iowa; NewOrleans, Louisiana; Denver, Colorado; Boston, Massachusetts; andWashington, D.C. Throughout theprogram, artist members of the Committee, including Chuck Close, ThomMayne, Edward Norton, Sarah JessicaParker, Kal Penn, Kerry Washington,Forest Whitaker, Yo-Yo Ma, DamianWoetzel, Alfre Woodard, and JohnLloyd Young, led songs, directed plays,organized photos shoots, and becamepart of the school community.Alfre Woodard, who made her firstvisit to the Rachel B. Noel School inDenver in the fall of 2012, explainedthe effect. We are “not just trying togrow artists, but we are expandingthe students minds and horizons.We are unfolding citizens, helping tocreate innovators.”Like all the pilot schools, Noel Schoolre-engineered teaching approachesand the curriculum through a rigorous instructional approach. Studentsthere incorporated song, dance,The First Lady and Turnaround Artistscame through with incredible support for Turnaround Arts students.First Lady Michelle Obama hostedwidely acclaimed White HouseTalent Shows. Hundreds of studentswere part of preparations for theseshows. For two full days, they couldbe seen playing on the South Lawn,rehearsing dance moves in East Wingsalons, and getting a chance to knowthe White House pets. Aside fromopening up the White House, theFirst Lady would often invite groupsof students to come for specialevents and made a visit herself to aTurnaround Arts school.Artists opened their hearts in muchthe same way. Citizen Cope broughta class of his students to Washington,D.C. paying for all costs and adding adollar to the price of each of his performances for additional music suppliesfor students. Josh Groban organizeda crowd source campaign for a muralbuilt at his school in Chicago. MistyCopeland got tickets for the students atthe school she is mentoring to come tothe ballet to see her perform. The generosity is born of a passion for helpingstudents who, like many of the artiststhemselves, could be saved by the arts.Turnaround Arts set out toachieve success that alignswith broader school reformgoals outlined in the Elementary andSecondary Education Act. Each schoolunderwent a thorough evaluation. Bythe end of the pilot program, complete integration of art into the curriculum of underserved schools wasfound to improve student academicachievement, student attendance, andparent and community engagement.Booz Allen Hamilton produced aSummary of Key Findings in the 8pilot schools that became part of thediscussion around education reform.The report showed Math proficiencyscores up on average 23 percent,Reading up an average 13 percent.Metrics for student attendance, parentengagement, and community involvement all improved while suspensionsand other discipline indicators wentdown. In addition, the TurnaroundArts schools outperformed schoolsthat had received similar amounts ofadditional federal assistance.

Turnaround Arts grew over the next five years into a national program that included 68 schools in 16 states. An impressive coalitionof partners supported the program, including the U.S. Departmentof Education, the National Endowment for the Arts, the NationalEndowment for the Humanities, the AOL Charitable Foundation,the Aspen Institute, Booz Allen Hamilton, Crayola, Deloitte, theFord Foundation, Google, the Herb Alpert Foundation, Inktel, iTheatrics, JCPenney Cares, the Keith Haring Foundation, Playing forChange, Little Kids Rock, Music Theatre International, the NationalAssociation of Music Merchants Foundation, the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation, the Rosenthal Family Foundation, SKDKnickerbocker, the Steven and Alexandra Cohen Foundation, the LairdNorton Family Foundation, Americans for the Arts, and the ArtsEducation Partnership. In 2015, it branched out to include a focuson early childhood education with the U.S. Department of Education and the Wolf Trap Center for the Performing Arts.In May of 2016, Turnaround Arts released a powerful music video of artists and students, teachers, and principals, singing Everyday People, bringing all schools together to share the message ofpossibility and success that Turnaround Arts capably embodies. Thevideo was estimated to have had 300 million initial impressionson social media, spreading the word on this creative approach toeducation reform.Looking to the future, the Committee has positioned TurnaroundArts for further expansion and to serve as a resource for everyschool district with an interest in this approach. The Committee hasinvested in greater public awareness of Turnaround Arts’ approach,has created a strategic partnership with the John F. Kennedy Centerfor the Performing Arts, and has ensured the program’s financialfuture into the next Administration. Turnaround Arts is developing anonline toolkit to bring its work to any school in the country. It continues to enjoy support from core funders and new partners.

“Today I am proud to sign a law that is going to make sure thatevery student is prepared to succeed in the 21st century.”—President Barack ObamaIn 2015, after years of the Committeedemonstrating the importance of thearts in education reform, PresidentBarack Obama signed the EveryStudent Succeeds Act, making thearts and humanities central to thebill’s description of a “well-roundededucation.” The bill now makes fundsavailable at the state and local levelfor arts integration and arts educationprograms that advance educationreform: programs like Turnaround Arts.Film ForwardIn 2006, when AFI Project: 20/20was launched as a film-based diplomacy effort, the core purpose of theprogram was to support filmmakersand their films by creating opportunitiesfor audiences and filmmakers to sharecommon stories, insights, and values.By launching a new partnership withthe Sundance Institute in 2010, thePresident’s Committee leveraged theassets and experience of this predecessor program to broaden its outreach toyoung and diverse audiences, as well asemerging filmmakers.The programs’ multicultural roster ofindependent films challenge its audiences to examine, reflect, and experiencethe impact that stories can have onindividuals and societies. The deepdive into humanistic themes in thesefilms introduces a new generation toother cultures and new ideas, dispellingmisconceptions.Film Forward discussions and exchanges are not just between audience andfilmmaker, but also between filmsthemselves, which creates a multiplicityof views on a subject. Like the 2014Detroit visit, which created a multifaceted conversation on the consequences of violence as experienced inthree different films—Fruitvale Station,Dancing in Jaffa, and Valentine Road.Over the program’s lifespan, films haveranged from highly-regarded independent features, such as Beasts of theSouthern Wild, to lesser known documentaries that address racial justice,artistic freedom, or family violence. Andit’s not unusual for these lesser-knowndocumentaries and films to win Emmysor an occasional Academy Award, asdid 20 Feet from Stardom, nor for aFilm Forward artist to win a National Humanities Medal, as did StanleyNelson.As filmmaker Stacy Peralta summarized, “We all want to believe that artbridges divides, crosses boundariesand connects people, and in this wireddigital age, with everything at ourfinger tips, this crazy street level ideacalled Film Forward, with a mandateto culturally hop fences and cross pollinate people with people, ended upworking. At least for this filmmaker itdid—and I believe it worked for all ofthose I met along the way and for ourentire team. It was non-digital, totallyanalog, down and dirty, and carriedout on the most basic gut level; eye toeye, hand shake to hand shake, andhug to hug. And it worked.”

“We see opportunities to place the arts and humanities at the forefront of cultural diplomacy overseas.”—Committee Co-Chairs Margo Lion and George Stevens, Jr.In the absence of a U.S. Cultural Ministry, and with representatives of every cultural agency as members of the President’s Committee on the Arts and the Humanities, thePresident’s Committee plays a role in U.S. cultural diplomacy.International Trade Association for Broadway, and theBroadway Community. These private funders made itpossible to take steps immediately with federal fundingand support to follow.When the 2010 earthquake threatened cultural heritagein Haiti, the Committee responded hand in hand withthe Smithsonian and other cultural agencies to begin thework of preservation. The Smithsonian Institution and thePresident’s Committee collaborated to create the HaitiRecovery Project. It included the Committee, the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Endowment forthe Humanities, and the Institute of Museum and LibraryServices, with support from the Broadway League, theThe Haiti Recovery Project helped the two nation’s governments to assess, recover, and restore the cultural andhistoric materials damaged by the earthquake. A buildingin Port-au-Prince that once housed the United NationsDevelopment Program was leased as a temporary conservation site where objects retrieved from the rubblecould be assessed, conserved, and stored. It also becamethe training center for dozens of Haitian nationals, whowould eventually take over this conservation effort.When President Obama made his historic visit to Cuba,it was the President’s Committee that led the first officialvisit, just one month later. The cultural mission to Cuba included the National Endowment for the Arts, the NationalEndowment for the Humanities, and the Smithsonian. Itconcluded with the public announcement of seven bilateral collaborations, the first government-to-governmentinitiatives to advance the policy of normalizing relationswith Cuba.The itinerary of the Delegation included both lively scholarly and artistic events and exchanges, as well as meetingswith Cuban government officials and directors of culturalinstitutions. Several ongoing cultural exchanges werediscussed with the Cuban government during the trip,and many were announced on the final day of the delegation at a bilateral press conference at the Gran Teatroin Havana. These included the NEH announcing a grantto bring art conservation exchange to Cuba and the NEAannouncing dedicated funds for artist exchanges betweenthe U.S. and Cuba. The Secretary of the Smithsonian reada joint statement about future collaboration with his Cuban government counterpart. The Committee announcedseveral opportunities to highlight Cuban successes in outof-school time youth programs, resulting in confermentof a National Arts and Humanities Youth Program Awardupon Cuba, as well as possible artist exchanges taking

Todos Somos AmericanosBy Committee Member Kal PennThe flight from Miami to Havanais just over 200 miles, about thesame distance as New York toWashington, D.C. We touched downat Jose Marti International Airport in lesstime than it takes to make a pizza, andin so doing became the first official U.S.Cultural Delegation to Cuba. Therehave been wonderful, detailed accountsof this historic visit, and its function(cultural diplomacy), nature (friendly andcollaborative), and outcomes (artisticand financial commitments), so I won’trehash those here. What I’ll focus on instead is the immeasurable component ofart itself in the rebuilding of relationshipsat a people-to-people level.The opportunity to share the universaljoys and struggles of family life, of puttingfood on the table, of love and loss, ofgreat friends—with an entire countrythat has been estranged for decades—that is something truly significant. Thearts nourish the soul and unify the human spirit. Thanks to the work of Presidents Obama and Castro, the beginningof this relationship between the UnitedStates and Cuba is now.In Havana we met with our artist counterparts: musicians, dancers, filmmakers,actors, authors. We watched films together, played music and danced together, discussed at length the challenges andrewards of producing art in Cuba and inAmerica. We wanted to know if Cuba’sincredible system of arts schools is anactual meritocracy. (It is.) They wantedto know why despite having world-classfilms and musicians, our public funding for arts & culture is so abysmal (it’scomplicated).We experienced what President’sCommittee Co-Chair George Stevenscalled, “the shock of recognition” thathappens, “when creative people fromdifferent worlds come together.” I’llnever forget the incredible pianist Miguel Ángel De Armas Junior, who I metnext to the art collective Fabrica de ArteCubano. He worked his way throughsome spotty English, and my Spanishis nonexistent, but there we were,communicating for hours through this“shock of recognition” about how weapproach the subtexts of emotion andjoy towards a global audience in muchthe same way. Wow, all of these yearsof prohibition, and here we are, twoartists younger than the embargo, recognizing the same humanity betweenour audiences, our societies.The new US/Cuba relationship allowsthese artistic conversations for the firsttime. We’ll preserve histories, advanceideas together, and build a more lastingpeace than that achieved through traditional paradigms. And change has come.What a wonderful time to celebrateunderstanding through art.place in schools in each country.Press coverage of the Delegationappeared in the Washington Post,New York Times, Huffington Post,the Miami Herald, and NationalPublic Radio.Members of the 2016 U.S. CulturalDelegation included Jane Chu, Chairof the National Endowment for theArts; William Adams, Chair of theNational Endowment for the Humanities; David Skorton, Secretaryof the Smithsonian Institute; GeorgeStevens, Jr. and Margo Lion, Cochairs of the President’s Committeeon the Arts and the Humanities;Megan Beyer, Executive Directorof the Committee; and Committeemembers Rick Arriola, StephanieCutter, Fred Goldring, Pamela Joyner,Eric Ortner, Ken Solomon, JanetKeller, Anne Luzzatto, Kal Penn,Alfre Woodard, John Lloyd Young,Liz Manne, Kim Taylor, Jill CooperUdall, and Andrew Weinstein. Artistmembers of the delegation includedJoshua Bell, Adele Chatfield-Taylor,Martha Clarke, John Guare, DJ IZ,Lourdes Lopez, Larisa Martinez,Dave Matthews, Smokey Robinson,and Usher.Throughout the eight years, thePresident’s Committee was calledupon to participate in diplomatic programming during official state visits.When Nordic leaders and the PrimeMinister of Singapore made officialvisits to Washington, the Committeepresented a program and performances by Turnaround Arts studentsand National Student Poets. NationalArts and Humanities Youth ProgramAward winners were often calledupon to perform at events as werethe National Student Poets.

Haiti Recovery ProjectThe Haiti Recovery Project wasdeveloped in response to the2010 earthquake, which devastated the island killing over 250,000and claiming the homes of 1.5 million.Amidst the destruction, Haiti’s culturalheritage was in jeopardy. The Committee and its partners stepped in to help.Actor and Committee member, ForestWhitaker described the situation thisway, culture is what “made them defeatNapoleon, achieve independence, andabolish slavery. And it’s kept them goingin a very, very impossible situation.”The Project assessed, recovered, andrestored over 500 cultural and historicmaterials and it rescued 20,000 historicalartifacts, dating back to pre-Columbiantimes. It also trained dozens of Haitiansin conservation to assume the workonce the relief teams departed.Members of the Haiti Recovery projectincluded Margo Lion, Co-chair of thePresident’s Committee; Mary SchmidtCampbell, Vice Chair of the Committee;Rachel Goslins, Executive Director of theCommittee; Committee Members RickArriola, Pamela Joyner, Olivia Morgan,Ken Solomon, and George C. Wolfe;Marsha Semmel, Acting Director withthe Institute of Museum and LibraryServices; G. Wayne Clough, Secretary,and Richard Kurin, Under Secretaryfor History, Art, and Culture, withthe Smithsonian Institution. Traci Slater-Rigaud, Director, Coming Up TallerProgram, also attended. Supporterswho joined the delegation included PaulLibin, Chairman, and Nina Lannan andCharlotte St. Martin with the BroadwayLeague, Bill Hillman with AffirmationArts, and filmmaker Jonathan Demme.In total, the Haiti Recovery project bothsaved thousands of priceless Haitian cultural assets and helped equip the nationto maintain and continue the work.“This is the beginningof a love relationship.”—Smokey Robinson,2016 U.S. CulturalDelegation to Cuba

“We tell each new class of National Student Poets thatthey are leaders and their voices can contribute tonational and community discussions, on every stage andat every table in the nation.”—Olivia Morgan, Member of the President’s CommitteeCredit: Official White House Photo by Amanda LucidanWhen 14-year old poetMoira Bass read one ofher poems in the EastRoom of the White House beforea couple of hundred guests in thespring of 2011, she became the inspiration for a new Committee artseducation v

arts education in a White House Champions of Change Arts Education roundtable. Led by Committee Vice Chair Mary Schmidt Campbell, then Dean of New York Univer-sity's Tisch School of the Arts, the roundtable of educa-tors and advocates showcased exemplary arts education programs raising academic performance in low income schools.