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NYC Arts in Education Roundtable

Testimony to the New York City Council Committee on Cultural Affairs & Committee on Finance — May 21, 2024

4 minutes

Testimony to the New York City Council Committee on Cultural Affairs & Committee on Finance
Hon. Carlina Rivera, Chair
Hon. Justin Brannan, Chair
Hearing: Executive Budget Hearing
Tuesday, May 21, 2024

Thank you to Chair Rivera, Chair Brannan, fellow Committee Members and Council staff, for your passion, leadership, and support of arts education in New York City. 

My name is Kimberly Olsen, and I am the Executive Director of the NYC Arts in Education Roundtable. I’m testifying as part of the It Starts with the Arts coalition — calling on our city to 1) prioritize funding for arts education in NYC schools and communities in the FY25 budget and 2) restore all cuts to arts and culture totalling $76M (FY24 and FY25).

We are grateful for the City Council’s support for culture and arts education in the budget response and most the $41M restoration of expiring federal stimulus funding for arts education. Opportunities like this mean:

Improving academic outcomes 
Preparing students to enter the workforce
Increasing parent involvement and student attendance
Giving students space to develop empathy and critical thinking skills

It all starts with the arts.

At last week’s Education Hearing, the Chancellor noted that cultural organizations “fill the gap” in the 307 schools that do not have a certified arts teacher and ensure that our city’s students have access to arts instruction. We know that at least 607 arts and cultural organizations partnered with NYC schools last year (the most ever). 

It should be no surprise that this spike in service coincided with a $45M add-on in funds to the Department of Cultural Affairs and establishment in the Support for Arts Instruction Initiative. Yet, in this interconnected ecosystem, this year we are seeing first-hand how cuts to the Department of Cultural Affairs deeply harm cultural organization’s ability to provide resources and partner with schools. 

Cultural organizations help students meet state instructional requirements, especially at the elementary school level (437 schools) and enrich school communities with resources (with 36% of schools reporting receiving funding from cultural organizations to support arts learning). Despite the uptick in the number of organizations partnering with schools, only 74% of schools reported partnering with an arts organization last year (down 10% from 5 years ago). We need transparent and system-wide reporting to understand where organizations and teachers are present (for context only about 80% of schools actually complete the annual arts survey). With schools citing “dance” or the “Apple Store” as cultural organizations. We believe there is potential to leverage data from DCLA and DOE to understand where the gaps in access exist. 

Arts Teachers and Cultural Organizations are essential partners in the delivery of arts instruction. But they can’t do that without sustainable funding — otherwise we stand to only widen the access gap for years to come.

New York City must ensure that our schools offer all students the rigor, encouragement, and inspiration they need to learn and thrive in today’s classroom. To lay the groundwork for universal access to arts education, the City must:

  • Hire certified arts teachers in every school ($38M): Ensure that all schools have at least one certified arts teacher, by bolstering the pipeline of certified arts teachers via supplemental certification program and filling arts staffing gaps (closing the equity gap for at least 307 schools).
  • Require DOE arts funding be spent on the arts ($15M): Boost the per student arts allocation to $100 from $80.47, and require that money be spent on arts education.
  • Restore and Enhance “Support for Arts Instruction” initiative funding: Build on city’s down payment and boost allocation from $4M to $6M.
  • Improve data transparency by compelling NYC Public Schools to provide a school-by-school breakdown of the state of arts education in public schools via a Legislative Services Request, T&C, and/or Oversight Hearing.
  • Restore and Baseline Funding for the Department of Cultural Affairs: Reverse November ($20M) and preliminary budget cuts to DCLA ($15.5M) and restore/baseline one-time addition of $45M to Cultural Institutions Group and all cultural organizations across the city.

Our city’s young people represent the future of our city. Please prioritize investment in arts education because that future starts with the arts. 

Thank you for your attention and consideration.

Kimberly Olsen
Executive Director
NYC Arts in Education Roundtable
kolsen@nycaieroundtable.org

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