Closing gaps
The new Houston ISD superintendent has a chance to repair institutional inequality.
Richard Carranza’s honeymoon as superintendent of HISD lasted three weeks. And then on week four, he became a referee during a bruising battle over whether the district should accept a $7.5 million gift in exchange for the naming rights for the High School for the Performing and Visual Arts.
Ultimately, the HISD trustees did the right thing for students. They accepted a grant from the foundation funded by Rich and Nancy Kinder, Houston’s modern day Jesse Jones. But what should have been a no-brainer turned into an embarrassing tussle when one trustee compared HISD to “a pimp” selling its schools.
The good news is that the gift did succeed in shining a light on a longstanding inequity in school resources for the arts within HISD. Not only are most HISD students unable to afford extracurricular arts instruction, some do not have access to a robust arts education in elementary and middle school.
The Arts Access Initiative, which was started to develop an action plan to ensure equitable arts access for every K-8 HISD student, found in its 2014-2015 survey of 214 campuses that 27 percent of the schools had no full-time fine arts teacher, 10 percent had no community arts partner, and 17 percent had no arts field trips or clubs.
HSPVA is a jewel of the HISD system and has a well-deserved reputation for its academics as well as its arts education. With more applicants than positions, prospective students must thread the needle of a highly competitive admissions policy and in addition, demonstrate proficiency in their artistic field through an audition to secure a spot.
Affluent students have an overwhelming and unfair advantage in meeting the challenges posed by the rigorous application process. They can afford the expensive musical instruments, dance and art lessons and books needed to have a shot at achieving excellence.
As a result, HSPVA has a significantly lower percentage of low-income students and black and Hispanic students than the district average. While 75.5 percent of the students HISD serves are economically disadvantaged, only about 17 percent of HSPVA students are.
Although a superintendent of schools can’t close the yawning gap between the poor and affluent in Houston, Carranza has an opportunity in his first 100 days to take steps to repair the troubling institutional inequity. The superintendent should ask our generous philanthropic community to help level the admissions playing field at HSPVA by beefing up lower school arts offerings. In addition, other area high schools need assistance securing the resources they need to give their students an arts education.
The Kinder Foundation grant laid the groundwork for this request, and by approving the grant, the HISD trustees have signaled that they are willing to partner with the donor community.
For starters, Carranza should solicit the community’s help in targeting art deserts. In this arts-rich city, it’s ridiculous that some schools have little to no contact with the arts. Furthermore, every band director in Houston should have access to the instruments that his students need to perform. Art teachers shouldn’t have to bring their own meager supplies to their classroom. Media classrooms should be stocked with the necessary audio-visual equipment.
Parents should weigh in also. They can learn where their child’s school stands with respect to key arts indicators on a new website set up by the Texas Cultural Trust and can use the information to advocate for more arts teachers and facilities.
Arts are important for more than enjoyment. Data compiled by the trust, shows that an arts education improves school attendance, that students who complete more art classes have up to 15 percent higher pass rates on standardized tests than students with fewer arts classes, and that at-risk high school students who complete more than one art class are half as likely to drop out.
With every leadership challenge, comes an opportunity. The new superintendent should seize his baptismal controversy and weigh in to help make the arts vibrant at every school regardless of the neighborhood’s income level.