The following letter was written for parents to send in to their School Board Representatives of the San Diego Unified School District which is currently faced with the possibility of having their Visual and Performing Arts Department completely eliminated due to budget cuts.  At local street art fairs, Young Audiences of San Diego's staff members walked around with a clipboard of letters, speaking to concerned parents about the potential cuts, and asking parents to sign the letter (listing their home address and the school their child attends).

Dear Education Board Member,

I am writing this letter to request that you remove cutting the San Diego Unified Visual and Performing Arts Department from the list of Plan B budget reductions.

By fueling a student’s imagination and creativity, the arts enhance a student’s problem-solving and critical thinking skills, which aid their learning in other subject areas.  An education in the arts exposes students to a variety of cultures while enriching their learning experience and teaching them how to be empathetic, tolerant and open to working with others, all necessary skills for success in a multi-cultural society.   

The San Diego Unified School District is the second largest school district in all of California and should not be without at Visual and Performing Arts Department.  The loss of this department could take years and a considerable amount of money to rebuild.  Policy makers have recognized the arts as a core-required course, as the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 did at the federal level, and they have created content standards in the arts stating what each student should know and be able to do at each grade level in the various art disciplines of music, dance, theater, and visual arts.

Yet though arts education is required and the standards are outlined in the California State Education Code, the code does not require schools to follow these standards and leaves the implementation of arts education at the discretion of each school.

Therefore, most students do not receive instruction in the arts at the level required by the state’s policy. Most schools haven’t implemented a comprehensive arts program into their curriculum because other subjects are given higher priority. Also, most arts programs suffer due to a lack of funding, under-prepared teachers, and inadequate facilities.

This is why we need a Visual and Performing Arts Department whose sole focus is to advocate for and insure that every school in the city district builds a strategic education plan that includes standards-based arts instruction for every child.  By eliminating the Visual and Performing Arts Department, you eliminate a child’s opportunity to participate in arts learning.  Learning that engages all students, helps build creative thinking skills necessary for employment in the 21st century, and empowers students by validating their unique perspective of their world.

Sincerely,

[signature]

Concerned Parent and Citizen

Young Audiences of San Diego

For 45 years, Young Audiences of San Diego has dedicated itself to integrating the arts into the education and lives of all children of our region through an extraordinary range of high quality performances, residencies and workshops to help our young people identify their cultural roots and discover their creative wings.