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Q&A
Inquiry into arts education funding distribution
2:33:47
·
3 min
Council Member Justin Brannan inquires about the distribution of $41 million in baselined arts programming funding. Paul Thompson, Executive Director of the Arts Office, provides a detailed breakdown of how the funding was allocated.
- $11.5 million was directly distributed to schools through SAM number 36
- Funding provided Adobe licenses to every DBN (school)
- Over 300 schools received arts partnership grants
- Funding supported principal fellows, facility upgrades, borough-wide music programs, and teacher professional development across various arts disciplines
Justin Brannan
2:33:47
I wanna jump over to arts education funding, something that's very important to me personally and to this council and to chair Joseph.
2:33:55
The council called on the administration to restore and baseline $41,000,000 for arts programming in schools, and we were pleased to see that the funding was baselined.
2:34:05
However, two ninety schools still do not have a certified arts teacher, and that continues to be a council priority.
2:34:12
So our understanding is that $11,500,000 of the $41,000,000 was directly distributed to schools through SAM number 36 for f y twenty five.
2:34:22
Could you tell us how was the remainder of the 41,000,000 in arts funding dispersed?
Paul Thompson
2:34:29
Good afternoon.
2:34:31
How are you?
2:34:31
A live mic.
2:34:32
My name is Paul Thompson.
2:34:34
I'm the executive director of the arts office, and I just wanna first say thank you for your support.
2:34:40
This is a great day for the arts, that arts funding is going to be baselined, so thank you.
2:34:47
So there's a number of ways that we could talk about this data for you.
2:34:52
What we provided was disaggregated data.
2:34:57
There were 44 touch points that the arts office was responsible for developing that touched all plus 1,500 schools.
2:35:09
And so I can talk about sort of the high level or I can actually go through each district and talk about how many DBNs per city council district were affected.
Justin Brannan
2:35:21
Yeah.
2:35:21
I mean, I I think just Go
Paul Thompson
2:35:24
Go ahead.
2:35:24
High level.
Justin Brannan
2:35:25
Yeah.
2:35:25
Just the process behind how that other 41,000,000 was was spent.
Paul Thompson
2:35:31
So the Arts Office is dedicated to making sure that we are supporting all schools in New York City, especially those that aren't auditioned and or screened.
2:35:42
And so one of the high level things is we provided Adobe licenses to every single DBN.
2:35:49
So every student will have access to high quality digital arts materials.
2:35:55
For arts partnership grants, there were plus 300 schools that were supported with this.
2:36:02
For principal fellows, there were a 70 different DBNs that were supported with this funding.
2:36:09
We did principal fellow upgrades.
2:36:13
So there were upwards of a 44 schools where principal fellows were able to receive facility upgrades.
2:36:20
So new paint, new furniture, new arts materials to help support the programming that they were putting together.
2:36:28
We have Salute to Music.
2:36:30
These are borough wide music programs.
2:36:34
There's a 60 DBNs that were covered in that.
2:36:37
There are the borough arts festivals.
2:36:41
And so just to go through those, you know, there there are hundreds of schools in each district or in each borough that are represented in those programs.
2:36:52
For our teacher professional development, we have visual arts.
2:36:57
Twelve hundred teachers saw support from that funding.
2:37:01
A 70 theater teachers, three hundred and 50 one dance teachers, five hundred and 80 three music teachers, three hundred and 90 seven teachers were supported in arts for diverse learners and MML support.
2:37:18
So again, this is just a high level look at how some of that funding was spent.