The National Agenda

The Arts has been included in the development of the national curriculum. A Media Release from the Hon Peter Garret MP, Minister for Environment, Heritage and Arts is available for download below.
 
The Australian Teachers of Media Qld is working with ATOM Vic, ATOM ACT, SAAME, and key media educators in Western Australia and New South Wales to form a national voice for media education. ATOM (The Australian Teachers of Media) represents each state's professional teacher network in the National Advocates for Arts Education (NAAE).
 
The NAAE has representation from each of the five art forms and has been a powerful and proactive voice in curriculum discussions at a Federal level since the 1990s.
 
Below is the media release from December 2008 from the NAAE. The NAAE convened meetings in 2008 with the Deputy Prime Minister, the Minister for Education, Minister for the Arts, and Minister for  Innovation, Industry, Science and Research, as well as Opposition education spokesperson. NAAE with Rob Randall, General Manager of the National Curriculum Board in April 2009.  Further meetings are being planned for May and June
 
 
Media Release

2 December 2008

Education Revolution? The Arts Have It!

Unless the arts are included as a key learning area in the development of a national
curriculum for schools, children coming through the system will be illiterate in the new
skill areas essential for the 21st Century.

So says a new lobby coalition, the National Advocates for Arts Education (NAAE)
which has just spent two days meeting with politicians and arts advisers in Canberra.

Comprehensively representing dance, drama, music and visual arts education, the
NAAE is urgently calling for the immediate inclusion of the arts in the work of the
National Curriculum Board and the Early Years Learning Framework.

NAAE believes that a culturally rich education is central to realising the
Government’s priorities for a genuine education revolution and fostering creativity,
innovation, cultural understanding and social inclusion in the Australian
workforce.

Recent Australian research evidence* backs international findings that arts education
develops these skills as no other subject area can. It demonstrates that visual, aural
and kinaesthetic abilities are essential for Australians to compete in the global
marketplace where the economy of the cultural industries is growing in importance.

The NAAE is planning a campaign for 2009 involving teachers, school principals,
parents, university teacher education bodies, industry and a range of other sectors
with an interest in the future of the education system.

NAAE members want to see:
• mandated representation of the arts within the curriculum K to 10
• radically overhauled pre- and in-service teacher education and professional development
• vastly improved arts teaching standards, resources and research.

 
The NAAE delegation provided evidence to those with whom it met, which confirmed
that arts education uniquely develops the aesthetic, emotional, physical, social and
cognitive capacity of all students.

“We need an expanded notion of literacy which is not just about being able to read,
write and manage numbers confidently. It must also encompass students' cultural
comprehension and self-expression. Current brain research must be applied in the
National Curriculum if we are to achieve an education revolution that fosters
innovation and creativity in next-generation leaders and thinkers” said an NAAE
spokesperson.


*National Review of Visual Education (2007) & National Review of School Music Education (2005)

For comment contact:
Derek Weeks, Australian Teachers of Media
Roger Dunscombe, Australian Teachers of Media
Marian Strong, Art Education Australia
Julie Dyson, Ausdance
Jeff Meiners, Ausdance
Sandra Gattenhof, Drama Australia
Dick Letts, Music Council of Australia
Tamara Winikoff, National Association for the Visual Arts 

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