National Art Education Association

Your PTA Can Help and You Can Help Them Do It!Author(s): Jo Alice LeedsSource: Art Education, Vol. 35, No. 2 (Mar., 1982), pp. 28-29+31Published by: National Art Education AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3192607 .

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Your Can Help and You Can Help Them Do It!

"There are many rewards In sharing the activitles of the art classroom with parents, and It is a good way to build parent support for your program."

Jo Alice Leeds

At their 1979 Convention the National PTA passed an important

resolution recognizing the need for arts education in the schools. This resolution read in part as follows:

WHEREAS, The National PTA believes that the arts-music, literature, dance, dramatics, and visual arts -are central to learning; and ...

WHEREAS, The infusion of the arts in the elementary, secondary and continuing education curriculum is a key to the humanistic development of students; . . .

RESOLVED, That PTAs create a public awareness of the arts; and

RESOLVED, That PTAs continue to be strong advocates of improved arts education programs; ...

This resolution clearly pledges the PTA to be an active advocate for arts education in the schools,

which do need the commitment and support of the PTA on both the national and local levels. However, art teachers often complain about the lack of public support for their programs. They also sometimes com- plain about interference with their programs in the form of art contests conceived by the PTA and various other community groups. But these contests represent an honest effort by their sponsors to support art pro- grams and to encourage student interest in art. When such contests are rebuffed by art teachers, those who offer them are bound to feel that their efforts to be supportive have been rebuffed. What exists is not a lack of willingness on the part of the community or parents to support art programs, but a lack of under- standing between parent groups and teaching professionals concerning the kind of activities which will best enhance the art program.

Art educators ought not to reject proferred support for art programs, even when the direction of that support seems misguided. We cannot plead that the general public is hopelessly ignorant of the true content and meaning of the art process, if we have made no effort to go out and explain our beliefs and objectives to them. All members of the art education profession should make efforts to rectify this lack of under- standing shared by parent groups concerning art programs and their needs. Parents are willing to listen and to respond in helpful ways. This has been demonstrated by the exper- ience of any number of art teachers who have taken the trouble to communicate clearly and frequently with their PTA organizations. In this way, strong parent support groups

can be developed and encouraged for the art programs in their schools.

The following information has been compiled from the personal experience of several such art teachers in North Carolina. They are: Con- stance Hess of the Burlington Public Schools, Patricia Meeks of the Wake County Public Schools, Lib Bell of the Greensboro Public Schools, and Steven House of the Durham County Public Schools. The schools in which these art teachers have taught and the budgets allotted to their programs are average for any public school system. What is unusual are the strong parent support systems they have built for their art programs by systematically working with and through their school PTA organizations. None of these teachers is ever heard to complain about unwanted interference with their pro- grams. Perhaps this is because they keep their PTAs so well informed about the true needs of a good art program, and so busy helping meet these needs, that such things as unwanted contests are happily for- gotten in the light of more meaningful activity.

What Your PTA Can Do for You Almost every school PTA group has the resources to provide the following kinds of support for an art program:

1. Money for permanent equipment such as potter's wheels, kilns, or looms.

2. Money for expendable supplies above and beyond the slim budget allocated to most art teachers.

3. Personnel help in the form of volunteer parent workers for special field trips or projects, such as setting up exhibits or matting student art work.

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4. Personnel and funding support for larger school or community arts projects such as arts festivals.

5. Vocal political support for the art program with school administrators and school board members.

6. PTA members may have contacts in local industry which are useful to arts programs.

Art teachers cannot expect, however, that their PTA groups will offer the above forms of support without being asked, and particularly without being made aware of the specific values of the art program to their children's education. To make an art program visible takes planning and work.

Making the Art Program Visible The things an art teacher can do to build awareness and understanding of the art program include the following:

1. Keep a continually changing display of student art work on exhibit in one area of your school. Arrange the display with attractive mattings and mountings. Add a typed or neatly lettered sign explaining something about the work shown. The printed word carries an authority of its own, and focuses attention on the learning content of the work. This ongoing show acts as an educative means for your colleagues and admin- istrators as well as for parents and visitors to your school.

2. Put up a special show for any important PTA meeting, either in or directly outside of the room where the meeting is to take place. Steve House accompanies his PTA art shows with large signs which point out the learning content of his elementary art program, such as: "Art is learning about materials," "Art is learning about your cultural heritage," "Art is learning about yourself."

3. Volunteer to give a short talk at a PTA meeting to explain your art program. Pat Meeks does a "Show and Tell" kind of talk for her PTA, at which she holds up examples of the children's art work and explains the learning content reflected in each piece. If your audience is a large one, develop a set of colored slides for this purpose, so the work can be seen clearly by everyone. Pat explains to the parents why an art teacher values the work of each child in its

own way as well as the work of the more gifted children. She informs them what their appreciation of their own children's efforts in art can mean to their children.

4. Set up one or more evening art workshops for parents, where they are invited to experience "hands-on" some of the processes you teach your students, such as weaving, block printing, or cutting a matte. Out of these workshops may come some parents who are eager to help on a volunteer basis in the classroom when these processes are being taught.

5. Plan a major group art project with your students which will serve as a contribution to your school or community. This may take the form of a mural, a stitchery banner, a wall panel of decorative tiles, a large mosaic or a group constructed piece of outdoor sculpture. Connie Hess makes a practice of organizing one such project with her middle school students every year. After consulting with her students, she presents the idea first to her principal and then to her local school board for approval. Then she presents the approved idea to her PTA, asking for specific kinds of help from parent volunteers for the project. When the project is well under way, she informs the local newspapers and TV stations about it, so that the work receives media coverage. Needless to say, her art program has the full support of her school administration and her PTA as well.

How to Ask for What You Need After you have made a well organized effort to make your program visible to parents, administrators, and the community, you will find that help and cooperation begin to come your way. Now you are in a position to ask for specific kinds of help and to reasonably expect to get it. What follows are some guidelines for procedure.

If you are on a tight budget you may want to ask your PTA for additional supply funds. Write a letter to your PTA's executive board explaining the ways in which your art program contributes to the education of the children, and how additional funds would enhance the program. Rules of thumb for such letters are:

1. Be positive in your point of view.

Point out what your program lacks that the parents might supply, but avoid a complaining manner. Such statements as "How can I be expected to teach art with no sink and only three pairs of scissors?" is unlikely to elicit a positive response.

2. Be specific in your request for help. State exactly what you need and tell exactly how much it will cost. Attach a list of items and prices and add up the total sum. Keep your request within the reasonable means of a PTA budget.

For example, consider the following letter which Steve House wrote to his elementary school PTA at the end of his first year of teaching. It is a model of effective approach. His PTA contributed every item asked for, and the following year offered even more for his art program before he got around to requesting it.

Dear Members of the Parkwood PTA Executive Board:

As the art teacher for Parkwood School, I have enjoyed the past year in getting to know our fine faculty and staff. I have also been impressed with the vigorous PTA support of the school and its teachers. I feel I have truly become a part of a community that works together.

During the past year I have seen a great deal of growth among our students in their art abilities and in their enthusiasm for art. I found it difficult to choose from the large numbers of creative works for our annual student art show at Northgate Mall. I am planning to put up our own student show here at Parkwood for the May 21st PTA meeting. If any of you have not been aware of the many art displays during the year, this will be an excellent opportunity to see our students' creative achieve- ments.

I would like to bring your attention at this time to a major problem we art teachers have in the area of budget. We are allotted $500 for art materials for the school year. This money is intended for both schools in which I teach- Parkwood and Pearsontown-with a total of about 1,250 students. This comes to about $.40 per

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child per year for art materials. With inflation especially affecting the art materials market, I can only afford to buy paper, crayons, glue, tempera paint, school scissors, and clay-in other words the bare essentials for the art program.

I am dedicated to giving our children the best art education possible, and I feel strongly that our students need a wider diversity of more challenging art materials so that their inherent creativity will be allowed to blossom and grow. Each student, on all grade levels, should be able to work with yarn and weaving. Each student should be able to experience glazing their pottery and sculpture. All 5th graders should be able to work with linoleum block printing. Good quality brushes and scissors are other items that should be provided as a part of the art program. Our students deserve to benefit from a high quality art program, and we should be dedicated to providing this opportunity.

I can't give them these materials with only $.40 per child to spend. I am asking you for your financial support in this endeavor. Enclosed is a budget request for next year with the materials requested and costs itemized. I am asking for a $300 supplement from the PTA to provide our students with the materials listed. This will add $.65 per child to the already existing $.40-a total of $1.05 per child for the children at Parkwood School. This will bring us closer to the national average of $1.95 per child per year for art materials. The educational advantages will bring us closer to the standard of art education we expect for our children.

Yours very truly,

Steven D. House Parkwood Art Teacher

Besides financial support, you may want to ask your PTA group for personnel support in certain instances. There are many rewards in sharing the activities of the art classroom with parents, and it is a good way to build parent support for your program. The rules of thumb in asking for volunteer parent help are the same as

those to be used in asking for monetary support. Be positive in your attitude when asking for help, and be specific about the exact times you want the parents to come and about what you would like them to do. Some teachers use volunteer parent help in the following ways:

1. Invite parents who have special skills in art to demonstrate their work as visiting artists in the classroom. Parents who are not artists themselves may know outstanding local artists or craftsmen, and can help you arrange visits from these people.

2. Some parents may be glad to act as teaching aides in the classroom. In order to use this kind of help effectively, you need to build a good working relationship with a few parents who are interested in increasing their own art skills. These parents can help provide the individual atten- tion that many students need in learning skills.

3. Parents can help with those tasks that take after-school hours. They can help you mat and hang art shows. They can help you load and fire the kiln. They can collect and deliver materials for special projects.

4. Ask the parents to collect specific items for use in the art program. Run off a list of needed items such as jars, pie tins, yarn and cloth scraps, to be distributed to PTA members. Arrange a specific place in the school where these items can be collected.

Thanking Those Who Help We all like to know that our special effort to help has been appreciated, so remember to write a letter of thanks to your PTA for any help they offer. Whenever possible, write a personal note to any parent who makes a special effort for the art program. A special framed "certificate of thanks" might be developed and used. The PTA parents do want to support the art programs in the schools. It is up to us, the art educators, to inform parents of what we are doing for their children, what kind of help we need from them in doing it, and to return their support with our appreciation.

Jo Alice Leeds is assistant professor in the Department of Art, University of North Carolina at Greensboro.

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