Olga Rios

City: ABC Unified
Position Seeking: Board Member Trustee Area 6

Question 1: Please share a meaningful experience you had with art (visual, dance, drama, music, media arts) while growing up and its impact on you.

When I was in high school, I was fortunate to have been invited to participate in a college prep program targeting low-income, minority, and first in their family to attend college. The program provided us with academic support, college guidance, and enrichment activities. On the weekends they would allow us to participate in activities that were incredibly meaningful and had a great impact. They took us out of our environment and communities and allowed us to experience the arts. They took us to landmark locations to enjoy the theater, music concerts, and museums. I had never before visited such places. They had us interact with people there. The Arts were for everyone. They wanted us to experience a completely different lifestyle and instill in us a sense of belonging. It also motivated me to want for a better life and strive to be successful through education. I attribute my love of the Arts to those experiences. The Arts are a part of my life and have become a significant part of my own children’s lives.

Question 2: How can arts education support student outcomes such as English language development, reducing the achievement gap, and preparing youth for college and/or meaningful careers?

Substantial research supports art education in improving student outcomes. On such study points to how music helps prepare students to learn and cultivates better thinking skills. Others suggest that it develops creative capacities for lifelong success. I have seen the benefits of including the arts it in my many years of teaching (16) and as school administrator. It can reduce the achievement gap by improving attendance and student performance by using the Arts as a learning tool.

Question 3: What do you think the role of the School Board should be in ensuring that students have continued access to a broad range of study subjects, including the arts (broadly defined)?

I think that the role of the Board should be to support the inclusion of the arts in the curriculum. It should also allocate it's funding so that schools have the resources needed for a good Arts program. In addition, I see the role of the Board as one to provide an environment where kids have a myriad of Arts programs to chose from, the equipment needed to learn the Arts (art utensils, instruments, etc.), and trained teachers to provide the instruction needed.

Question 4: In light of the Local Control Funding Formula and development of district Local Control Accountability Plans (LCAPs), what are your creative solutions for achieving goals in the eight priority areas?

I think that LCAP is an excellent opportunity for schools who used to struggle with resources have more money to work with. One example, is to include the arts and align them to the eight priority areas. We know what it takes to get kids to achieve, parents to participate, and schools to shine. We just need to keep doing better. We also know that embedding the arts into the various content area increases engagement and achievement.

H. Ernie Nishii

City: ABC Unified
Position Seeking: Board Member Trustee Area 3

Question 1: Please share a meaningful experience you had with art (visual, dance, drama, music, media arts) while growing up and its impact on you.

My mom is an artist. I lived art daily. I even had tie died underwear. Art gets to your soul. When the rational doesn’t sink in art passes through our conscious mind to our essence. My mom’s art depicting the incarceration of thousands of innocent Americans of Japanese descent hits us in the primal part of our brain. That is,the most effective way to prevent it from happening again in a country that guarantees freedoms.

Question 2: How can arts education support student outcomes such as English language development, reducing the achievement gap, and preparing youth for college and/or meaningful careers?

Jobs was an Artist. Einstein was an Artist. The future lies with artists and the free concepts of expression. Not necessarily the programmer. If you love to express yourself you will do it through art and through writing. They are not mutually exclusive and come from the same part of the brain. If you love school you will do better. Art helps you express yourself and therefore if you associate school with art and expression you will do better.

Question 3: What do you think the role of the School Board should be in ensuring that students have continued access to a broad range of study subjects, including the arts (broadly defined)?

The board can encourage art through scheduling and through enabling world class artists in our classrooms. We did that at Leal. We got world class Korean dance instructor to teach our kids. We did an rfp to get a great artist to do a project with kids. We used Paul Soldner techniques for elementary kids. We don’t dumb down. We elevate.

Question 4: In light of the Local Control Funding Formula and development of district Local Control Accountability Plans (LCAPs), what are your creative solutions for achieving goals in the eight priority areas?

Parents. We were able to fundraise 100k per year to get extra arts instruction. We got parents to pay the teachers for tutoring and the profits after paying the teacher were used for the kids.

Gregory Pitts

City: Compton Unified
Position Seeking: Board Member

Question 1: Please share a meaningful experience you had with art (visual, dance, drama, music, media arts) while growing up and its impact on you.

One of my most meaningful experiences with the arts growing up has to be when I took drawing in high school. I had never been particularly artistic and couldn’t draw at all. My teacher was very encouraging and thoughtfully guided me through one of my favorite concepts in art, perspective. I really enjoyed the ways in which on could play with scale and show movement. Although much of what you do with perspective requires you to use a ruler, I felt that I became skilled in this area. Because of the teacher I had, I became more confident in what I didn’t know I was capable of.

Question 2: How can arts education support student outcomes such as English language development, reducing the achievement gap, and preparing youth for college and/or meaningful careers?

Arts education has a great influence on improving the educational outcomes of our students. For example, this is why the ‘A,’ was added to the S.T.E.M. acronym bringing about S.T.E.A.M. The influence of the arts on science education is tremendous. Without the arts, we would never have the visually appealing style of some of our most beloved pieces of technology such as the iPhone and many other Apple products. Students need to understand that there is a niche for them in any field of study that they may want to embark upon, and the arts are the common thread. Whether it is drama, graphic arts, music et cetera. The arts can open up many doors to new and untapped abilities within all of our students that they didn’t know where available to them.

Question 3: What do you think the role of the School Board should be in ensuring that students have continued access to a broad range of study subjects, including the arts (broadly defined)?

School boards have a moral obligation to ensure that all students have access to relevant and viable arts programming that will allow them to explore their untapped abilities that will make them more competitive in the post-secondary arena and the world of work.

Question 4: In light of the Local Control Funding Formula and development of district Local Control Accountability Plans (LCAPs), what are your creative solutions for achieving goals in the eight priority areas?

In light of the LCAPs eight goals, my plan would be to partner with as many stakeholders as possible. Including parents, PTSA groups, city and local officials, businesses, and nonprofit organizations that can offer enrichment programming that will help to enhance the experiences of our students and move us toward meeting those goals.

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