Last week, while feasting on a tamale dinner in the San Francisco Mission, and sharing lessons learned from our latest career adventures, Anne asked me, “So, Amy, what board are you on?” Well, actually, none at all. “I’m taking a break from boards,” I said while tucking into my rice and beans.

Anne would not let me off that easy. “The smartest thing you can do for your development is to get on a board that takes you to the next stage of your career. Think about what it is you want to be doing in two or three years and find a board that takes you in that direction.”

Once again Anne gave me food for thought. If I am serious about playing a leading role in the arts I need to start playing the part. I have been thinking about Anne’s advice and mulling it over with friends. We all agree that it is a strategic move. It also means I need to start thinking about my career next steps. Mapping Ideas into Action:

To articulate my career goals I am using a stack of colorful post-its to create a giant mind-map on my bedroom wall. On each post-it I have written a single noun or verb that comes to mind when I think, “Where do I want to be three years from now?” The post-it quilt of ideas expands beyond my career goals to include my private life as well. Now I am at the stage of looking at these single words and re-arranging them to create relationships, paths, and priorities.

From here I will use the GROW coaching methodology: what is my GOAL? What is my current REALITY? What are OPTIONS for reaching the goal? When WILL I move into action? I am finding the visual mind-map with all its moveable parts exceptionally handy in this career exploration.

Please let me know if you give it a try, have additional thoughts or suggestions, and how it works for you.

Watch video of the event on the Center for American Progress Web site.

Woman: An Intimate Geography. Natalie Angier (non fiction). Angier is one of the best science writers out there. A must read for women and men who love women. You’ll laugh out loud and learn a lot about what makes a woman a woman.

Modoc: The True Story of the Greatest Elephant that Ever Lived. Ralph Helfer (non fiction). Any animal lover will be awe-struck by this true story of an elephant and a boy born on the same day. Yes, there are some hard passages, but the ending is all good.

Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time. Dava Sobel (non fiction). Sobel unwinds the “discovery” of longitude. Like gravity, it always existed, we just never knew how to measure it. This story reveals its historic significance, relationship to the dominance of the high seas, the invention of the wrist watch, and Greenwich Mean Time.

Shardik. Richard Adams (fiction/fantasy). Adam is famous for writing “Watership Down” but what I love about this book is how you can tell it was written long hand in pencil in a pre-word processing era. The sentences are long and textured but they weave so much description into them. This tale has multiple layers of complexity and symbolism. Tolkien and Rawlings learned a thing or two from Adams.

Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea. Charles Seife (non fiction). Mathematically, conceptually, and philosophically, the idea of “nothingness” is very problematic concept—which is what makes this book so fascinating. Not for the math-adverse or math-phobic. Counting zero may be one of the greatest mental accomplishments of mankind and this book explains why.

Myths of Innovation. Scott Berkun (non fiction). It should be no surprise that I am fascinated by the creative process. What makes an idea unique? This quick read challenges some taboo topics and long-held assumptions about what constitutes a “breakthrough.”

Secret Lives of Lobsters. Trevor Corson (non fiction). My mother was a fishmonger, so I grew up selling fish outside of Boston since I was 12 (she even wrote a cookbook). Like Longitude, this book gives whole new insight into the biology, sociology, and historical significance of this bottom dwelling crustacean. I confess that lobsters really aren’t my thing, but I know how much people love them!

History of Love. Nicole Krauss (fiction). Don’t let the title detract you from this novel. This is actually a book within a book about a book. I love those types of stories. Beyond her skilled, fluid writing, Krauss takes right angles in her characters that I didn’t see coming. Each nuance is to be savored. This book reminded me not to predict the outcome and just enjoy the story as it unfolds. When it ended, I cried because it was so beautiful and because its trance had ended. So I flipped it over and read it all over again.

River God & Seventh Seal. Wilbur Smith (fiction). Pure brain candy for the erudite mind. A healthy dose of Egyptology mixed with delicious suspense and a masterful protagonist (Tiata). Seventh Seal is the sequel to River God. There are other books in the series. These are the only ones I’ve read.

Golden Compass | Subtle Knife | Amber Spyglass. Phil Pullman (fiction/fantasy). Trilogy. Also great brain candy and it is not your average adolescent literature. If you can get through the first ~75 pages, you will be flying through this series. It mixes my three favorite themes together: religion, science, and identity development.

The Far Pavillions. M. M. Kaye (fiction). This 960-page epic is set against the backdrop of India and Afghanistan during the 1860s. You feel vaulted back in time and experience deep cultural traditions and stunning landscapes with such thick detail. There’s love, lost, cruelty, survival, betrayal, and everything in between.  Like Shardik, this read is full of long narrative hand-written sentences.

If you have read any of these, or have any suggestions you’d like to share, please add a comment!

We are currently accepting proposals to present. DEADLINE: AUGUST 1.

Below are some suggestions for what separates a good proposal from a weak proposal.

A good proposal:

• Presents transcendent ideas, concepts, and/or advanced professional practice.
• Offers usable information (tips, tools, strategies, worksheets) that can be easily transferred to most settings.
• Appreciates the nuances of complex topics and issues and helps make them more understandable.
• Values the inclusion of diverse, even divergent, perspectives.
• Are concretely tied to our convention theme and track descriptions.
• Offers opportunities for audience participation and engagement with ideas and presenters. 

A weak proposal:

• Does not address the convention theme or track description.
• Showcases a program or work as a stand alone case study.
• Does not examine themes or trends within the sector.
• Has no tangible learning outcomes or takeaways.
• Lacks comparative analysis on how the model/idea/issue can exist in other settings.
• Offers uniformity of perspectives and lacks diversity.
• Are designed around the dissemination of content and do not engage the audience in higher order thinking and professional reflections.

We welcome the opportunity to speak with anyone thinking about submitting a proposal. 

PROGRAM LEADS
Arts Education: John Abodeely
Leadership: Rebecca Borden
Career360: Rebecca Borden
Public Art: Liesel Fenner
Economic Development: Mary Margaret Schoenfeld
Civic Engagement: Michael del Vecchio
Private Sector: (Ms.) Jay House
Public Sector: Natalie Schoop
Preserving Diverse Cultures: Anne L’Ecuyer

“Be patient toward that which is unresolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves. Do not now seek answers which cannot be given to you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually without noticing it live along some distance day into the answer” ~ M. Rilke

And so, today, I exit this stage, not because I don’t enjoy the privilege of working with you through Americans for the Arts, but because I am making a commitment to pursing my next role as “Professional Coach.”

{deep bow}

Rebecca

Rebecca Borden, PhD
E: rebecca.borden@gmail.com
W: www.rebeccaborden.com (coming soon!)

The 21st century movement toward less didactic and more collaborative education for our next generation has been especially focused on the place of the arts in learning. As our schools and community partners work to redesign the classroom with more experiential opportunities, we are also redesigning the shape of leadership and resource delivery to serve these new environments.

As the director of a state-level service organization for arts education, I am trying to determine whether the changes are good or not.

It is good that with popular emphasis on the holistic, simultaneous, contextual, imagistic, and intuitive characteristics of artistic or right-brain function, the arts are seen as an ally to education. Historically, arts and education communities have been allies when they found themselves on the bottom of the funding ladder together. They shared an identity that appeared to take more from society than it could give. That was not so good.

To seize current opportunity and make use of our shared potential, schools, cultural organizations, policymakers, funders, and individuals are using consortia to surround arts education with leadership at all levels and through many perspectives. There is a strengthening of national, professional networks to do this.

• The Arts Education Partnership (AEP) hosts gatherings that highlight examples of applied research and that motivate new research to be pursued.
• The Americans for the Arts Annual Convention and web communities integrate arts education into other conversations of national artistic concern.
• The National Association of State Arts Agencies (NASAA) maintains a network for decentralization of funds and trends through state arts agencies to individual artists and organizations.
• The US Department of Education (USDOE) funds and disseminates model program outcomes through support of regional laboratory models that are then linked to Americans for the Arts, AEP, and NASAA advocacy measures.

On the local level, when a teacher turns to our agency seeking dollars for an artist residency, we require that teacher to establish a collaborative relationship with an artistic partner. We also recommend that s/he attend some of our local Arts Education Roundtable sessions, write a letter to a legislator on a current issue, and invite him/her to attend a statewide policy and professional development conference for arts integration and resource development. We want her to be an advocate, a leader, and an excellent practitioner. This seems to be good, even bountiful, because there was a time when such consortia and delivery systems did not exist.

What is not so good is that in our excitement to distribute leadership and to give the power to the people, we may be forgetting that many of our people are already well-connected artists, educators, and leaders in their schools or organizations. Many of the coordinators of the roundtables, decentralization, and professional development organizations report that they have low attendance, low follow-through from participants on out-the-door tasks, minimal data or responsiveness to surveys.

In the state of New York we have an intricate, beautifully maintained arts in education leadership network that has been carefully nurtured under the leadership of the New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA). The elements of this framework include:

• Web portals that guide individuals to the resources available for their discipline, region, or special area of need.
• Decentralized state arts council grants (24 county-assigned sites) for arts integration partnerships titled “Local Capacity Building.” These grants allow for local leadership and panels that can serve varying needs of rural, urban, and suburban communities.
• Local arts education roundtables (12 region-assigned sites) for general, ongoing technical assistance and professional development such as access to experts, research, referrals, and match-making.
• Multi-year arts integration grants known as Empire State Partnerships that require intensive fund matching, professional development, partnership practice, evaluation, and dissemination of best practice. This is administered by the state arts council.
• “Regional Leadership and Learning Networks” are also regional consortia specifically for long-term arts integration partnerships that have been funded by the state.
• One annual statewide conference called “CommonGround” that for more than 30 years has been serving teachers, artists, cultural organizations, and schools in policy shaping, networking, and professional development. This is administered by my organization.
• One statewide summer institute that is required for state grant recipients. This seminar series features a model for reflecting on and refining best practices in long-lasting partnerships
• Many small regional conferences, advocacy, and professional development events that are administered by the NYS Alliance for Arts Education and other state wide education and arts associations.

With this abundance of entry points for leadership, access to research, advancement in practice, and so on, we have potential for leadership developing in every corner of our state. This is very, very good.

What is not so good is that this leadership development in every corner of the state sometimes appears to be large and time-consuming leaving little time for applying expertise to the classroom, to the studio, to our arts in education partnerships. The huge acronym soup of resources has been kindly dubbed the “EIEIO” network. Newcomers to the NY State arts in education community do require some convincing when it appears that a large percent of grant dollars and time are devoted to maintenance of the network and not as evident in the residency budget for teaching artists, performances, supplies, etc. That teacher who comes to us for a little grant is sometimes a victim of our own success when she walks away with her arms full of choices and inspiration and forgets what she came looking for in the first place.

The remedy in our state for the moment is a careful and sensitive system of checks and balances. Because we do have an abundance of empowered artists, educators, and leaders for arts education, we are better able to be self-critical, to be wary of quick fixes and easy solutions. We can share forecasts along that network and best predict our next strategies for richer learning and juicy creativity.

So the question remains: when we look to the national level and hear the cries for more conferences, more consortia, networks, blogs, websites, newsletters, gatherings, you-name-its—are we going to be prepared to manage this wealth of leadership? Or are we just building something that will ultimately draw dollars and time away from our children and their arts education? Thought-leader Daniel Pink has reminded us that creativity is a more critical commodity when we are in an era of abundance. If we can own that abundance and keep the web of information and connections focused, then perhaps we can actually advance the place of the arts in the 21st century classroom as essential.

 Laura Reeder is founding executive director of Partners for Arts Education in New York. She is the Newsbreak Editor for the Teaching Artist Journal, a visual teaching artist, pre-K–12 educator, and adjunct professor of Cultural Foundations of Education and Arts Integration for social-educational settings at SUNY Oswego and Onondaga Community College. She has been a consultant/collaborator with the New York State Council on the Arts, the New York State Alliance of Arts Organizations, Lincoln Center Association of Institutes for Aesthetic Education, and hundreds of schools and cultural organizations. She is currently an advisor and “firestarter” to the Governor’s “Brain Drain” initiative. Reeder is also a member of the Arts Education Council of Americans for the Arts.

T-Test & R-Coefficient (aka Terence McFarland and Randy Engstrom)
Terence, you make the 5 o’clock shadow an art form at any hour of the day. Randy, you wear leather wrist bands that even a wonder woman like me would covet…if only I had a golden lasso. I’ve upped the ante on you two and can’t wait to see how you’ll open the Leadership Track in Seattle.

Joyce Fellows
What a beautiful quilt of ethnic fabrics you guys are. A posse of power in the works. Can’t wait to see what your legacy is going to be.

Emerging Leader Council
It’s amazing to watch how you continue to animate your own center of gravity—even as you approach your 10th year.

James, Moe and Roberto
Being in your presence is like touching soapstonesoft to the touch but also absorbing the deep thermal heat of cultural complexities like no one else.

The Fire Alarm
How ironic that one sense of community is validated most in a state of emergency.

Amazing Women Everywhere
If you are only as good as the company you keep, I must be doing pretty well. Personal “shout outs” go to: Julia Kirt, Julia Lazarus, Julie Klaiber, Julie Bates, Coach Julia, Dawn Ellis, Victoria Saunders, Hoong Yee Lee Krakauer, Amy Kweskin, Vanessa Rawlings-Jackson, Brechin Flournoy, Danielle Brazell, and Silagh White.