NEA Fine Arts Caucus Logo Design Winner

Proposed New Business Items

2012 NEA REPRESENTATIVE ASSEMBLY NEW BUSINESS ITEM

Work to highlight student performances during NEA events.

Develop workshops on arts education to be conducted at the NEA Regional Conferences.

Devote portions of NEA’s TODAY to the arts;

Act as a partner with fine arts organizations to disseminate existing arts advocacy information and develop additional resources that create the “NEA Arts Advocacy Toolkit.”  The NEA Arts Advocacy Guide will be posted on the NEA website.

The NEA Arts Resource Guide will contain pieces that address the importance of the arts in a student’s comprehensive education, the need for the arts to be represented in curriculum reform, highlight models of effective advocacy campaigns and provide specific tools for students, arts educators and supportive patrons to use as they advocate for students.

Promote the Arts Advocacy Resource Guide in the NEA Communique, at NEA events, on the website and in social media.

Rationale:  It is our responsibility to make sure that the arts be protected in these trying times.  Educators and community members need guidance and support to keep arts programs as a vital part of a student’s comprehensive education.

NEA Fine Arts Caucus members have researched these sites and will gladly do the legwork to assist NEA Communications in accomplishing this.

Campaign Aims to Raise $5 Million for Theater Education

By Erik Robelen on May 2, 2012 4:10 PM

A new fundraising initiative is looking to bring in $5 million to support theater education in 19 U.S. cities. It comes as a recent federal report suggests that access to drama and theater instruction in elementary schools has sharply declined over the past decade, and at the secondary level, it's harder to come by in high-poverty schools than those serving more-affluent populations.
The new campaign, dubbed Impact Creativity, was launched this week with a $200,000 gift from accounting firm Ernst & Young LLP and its partners and principals. It's being orchestrated by the National Corporate Theatre Fund, based in New York City.

“I see little of more importance to the future of our country and our civilization than full recognition of the place of the artist.” JFK

Posted by Raymond Tymas-Jones On May - 1 - 2012

National Arts Advocacy Day is significant because it grants us an opportunity to gather as a community to reflect on the role of contemporary artists in the 21st century. No matter what the chosen art form, the passion to do art and to be art is born out of an insatiable yearning to make beauty, to make sense, and even to make waves.

As artists, we are summoned to bear witness of the truth of the human experience…the human condition and truth is more than simply facts. It is realness of life that is imbued with the psychological, emotional, spiritual elements of living that is not always easily accessible. It is this sense of urgency to communicate that artists find avenues to connect through music, theatre, film, dance, art, and literature.