House Proposes Slashing Major Arts Education Grant
The program has awarded millions in grants for organizations serving families living below local poverty lines.
Arts advocacy groups are sounding the alarm after a congressional subcommittee last week approved a budget proposal that would eliminate the Department of Education's (DE) only arts grant program.
The Republican-chaired House Appropriations Committee, a congressional subgroup that shapes the government’s annual budget, advanced a proposal that could defund the DE's Assistance for Arts Education program last Tuesday, June 9.
"The Assistance for Arts Education program is the federal government’s only dedicated arts education grant program,” Erin Harkey, CEO of the advocacy nonprofit Americans for the Arts, explained in an email to Hyperallergic. “Eliminating it would reduce support for critical work that students, educators, and communities depend on, including teacher professional development, accessible arts education programming, community partnerships, and arts education outreach.”
Last week, the committee asked Congress to allocate $0 to the program, which was established in 2015 to fund primary and secondary arts education with an emphasis on “disadvantaged students” and children with disabilities.
The program has awarded millions in grants to institutions providing arts education to organizations serving families living below local poverty lines. Americans for the Arts’s ideal funding for the grant program is $40 million.
In a 452-page report, the House subcommittee cited “the continued decline of public school performance and student achievement across the country,” and said that funding “should be focused on core education such as reading, writing, and math.”
Overall, the subcommittee suggested reducing the DE’s total funding by 10%, or $8 billion, as the Trump Administration attempts to completely dismantle the agency.
In previous years, Assistance for Arts Education has awarded millions to the John F. Kennedy Center for Performing Arts for the institution’s pre-k through high school educational initiatives, as well as six-figure grants to individual school districts and arts organizations across the country.
Last year, the program received $36.5 million from Congress’s final budget despite similar funding threats. However, the following award cycle requested applications for programs that promoted “patriotic education,” such as a Cleveland Play House initiative that received $830,000 to “enhance patriotic education through arts integration.”
Threats to the DE’s Assistance for Arts Education program come shortly after the House Appropriations Committee approved a proposal that would cut funding for the National Endowment for the Arts and Humanities (NEA, NEH) for the second year in a row. Despite early adoption of Trump’s proposed NEA and NEH cuts last year, Congress funded both agencies at normal levels.
The Senate will also draft its own budget proposals before both houses agree on a single funding bill later this year.
“Funds may be appropriated in Washington,” Americans for the Arts CEO Harkey said, “but their impact is felt in communities across America.”
