(Editor's Note: Since this story was printed in 1999, the funding for ΢²ªÊÓƵ ArtsBridge has undergone a dramatic reduction in concert with cuts to higher education in the state budget. ΢²ªÊÓƵ students can now get course credits as interns in the program.)
Graduate art student Vonn Cummings-Sumner teaches first graders about color. They teach him about their learning curve as 6- and 7-year-olds.
The learning exchange takes place in a new outreach program, ArtsBridge, in which 22 ΢²ªÊÓƵ art, music and theater students teach in 20 Sacramento area classrooms. The ΢²ªÊÓƵ students get a scholarship and teaching experience through ArtsBridge. Area schools, many of which lack formal art instructors, have an opportunity to have artists visit once or twice a week for eight weeks or so.
Davis is implementing the program this fall; UC Irvine pioneered the program four years ago, and it became available throughout the UC system last spring. ArtsBridge encompasses both visual and performing arts, though in its first year at ΢²ªÊÓƵ focuses primarily on visual art.
"We're trying to reintegrate the arts into schools, getting across the idea that the arts are a vehicle for learning, not just a 'fun' side event. Art is a useful, hands-on process to help the child grow and understand themselves and the world at more than just the linear cognitive level," says Cornelia Schulz, art professor and director of ΢²ªÊÓƵ ArtsBridge.
ArtsBridge is supported through funds allocated to UC by the state legislature; each campus applies annually for part of that money. For the 1999-2000 academic year, ΢²ªÊÓƵ received $160,000.
The program is a win-win for both the student scholars and for the participating schools.
"I say to the scholars 'you have a mission' to assist in correcting the unfortunate dilemma of diminishing funds to the arts in K-12. This project tries to help bring the arts back into the classroom," Schulz says.
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