National Core Arts Standards

Released – June 4, 2014

The National Core Arts Standards were publicly released on June 4. In celebration, a webinar was provided that included several guests including our own Director of the Maine Arts Commission. Julie Richard spoke eloquently about the need for those responsible for arts education to work collaboratively with the next steps of the standards.

If you missed the webinar you can access the archive by clicking here and following these directions.       If you did not attend the event as audience, you will need to fill in the brief registration form. If you attended as an audience member, use the password you received when you logged in to the meeting.

Several teacher leaders from the Maine Arts Assessment Initiative reviewed and provided feedback during the development of the standards in the last year. These standards cover not only dance, music, theatre, and visual arts, but also the interdisciplinary field of media arts. The standards are built on the Artistic Process model.

The Conceptual Framework for the standards is available at nccs.wikispaces.com. If you have questions please check the FAQ by clicking here. 

The following blog about the new standards was posted on the Education Week curriculum blog at this link. You can access and download the standards for all five disciplines by clicking here.                  

Opportunities to pilot Model Cornerstone Assessments in your classroom will be announced soon by your professional arts education association (NAEA, NAfME, NDEO, EdTA, etc.).

Thanks to Scott Shuler for providing some of the information for this post. And for those of you who know Scott, after 25 years as the Connecticut Department of Education’s Arts Consultant, he will be retiring on July 1. Maine wishes him well as he continues on his journey committed to quality arts education!