(Elaine Chin - speaker):
The arts conference is a wonderful way for us to provide professional developmental for our teachers in preparation in both our Elementary program, as well as our Child and Adolescent Development program. These are undergraduates who are interested in going into teaching. And one of the things that we have not been able to be as successful at in our public schools is providing arts education for all children. We focus so much on the academic side of schooling that we have missed development of other aspects of a child’s education or development. So for us what the arts conference does is allows us to enrich or expand our offerings to our students without increasing anything in our program or adding any units or asking students to take any more courses. It allows them to network with other teachers in area interested the arts, and to know about the other various arts organizations in the Silicon Valley who can be great supporters for them when they go out into the teaching world.
(Lisa Gonzales - speaker):
What I think is unique and special about this conference is that it focuses on two really key constituent groups: Student teachers (or pre-service teachers) and in-service or practicing teachers. And I think that is really important, because we have presenters who are able to address their presentations to the needs of both. For student teachers going through a credential program being able to understand just some of the very basics of the art and how they can be creative in their classroom, but really also survive that first and second year I think is really critical. And for the seasoned teachers who have maybe been teaching for two or three years who come to the conference, they are able to get a different set of skills. They are able to push their teaching a little more. They are able to really focus on arts integration and how certain activities can be used across multiple subjects in a way only they really truly understand their curriculum. The other thing that I think is really special about this is that teachers are able to come to this conference for the most part for free. And in a day and age where budgets are being slashed left and right and conference fees are going up, to have the funder who is able to come in, and partnerships that are able to provide really strong in-kind support for all the manpower that is takes to pull something like this off -- it truly is an accomplishment like no other.
(Elaine Chin – speaker):
There are two aspects in thinking about art education. One is teaching kids about the arts in terms of appreciation for and understanding of the role the arts play in maintaining our cultural heritage and common history. The other part of arts education is art is a creative way of getting at other kinds of thinking, ways of understanding, coming to appreciation and represent your world. So art is an ideal way for children to learn about scientific reasoning, mathematics, literature, history, and social sciences. It is a vehicle by which we can come to understand those other subjects more deeply or in a very different way.
(Jansie Tompkins – speaker):
From the student’s standpoint, I think the leadership opportunities and then how people realize that you know, I never liked history at all. And so to incorporate something that I liked like art into history makes it fun for all ages, not just kids. You can bring it even into high school.
(Robin Love – speaker):
What was really exciting to me and made the conference almost magical was watching the students realize how they can incorporate art into other curricular areas. Just seeing their excitement, seeing how inspired they were by all the different kinds of workshops that they went to was wonderful. It was also neat for them to make the connections with arts organizations in the area and with local artists, and also with teachers who came. We had teachers who were San Jose State alumni from just a few years back. And seeing them be able to share what they do and interact with the students – it was wonderful in that sense because the level of sharing that went on.
We are deeply grateful to Marion Cilker for the very generous donation she made that made all this possible and started this out. And it is exciting to know about some of the things that we are hoping to do with this. We definitely want to see this conference go for the ten years that we have promised Mrs. Cilker that it would. But we would also like to see it go way beyond the ten years and become something that teachers in the area can count on and that it can be a chance for local artists and art organizations to connect with teachers and credential students. We would like to expand the grade level range and just make it into something that people really look forward to. So we have big plans. From what that started out with Mrs. Cilker’s contribution, we want to see this grow.
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