Report Looks to Schools To Revitalize the Arts

By Kathleen Kennedy Manzo

After years of neglect and budget cutbacks, arts education could hold the key to reforming the school curriculum and restoring community support for the arts, a federal report suggests.

"It is precisely because these are the worst of times [for public education], with more pressure than ever before on our schools to pull themselves out of a prolonged downward spiral, that these are also potentially the best of times for arts education," says the report, released by the National Endowment for the Arts last week.

"Since nothing else has worked," the report continues, "the arts and humanities are poised to become leading contenders in the school reform sweepstakes and to re-establish themselves in...