Arts Now! The Benefits of Arts Education Within Education as a Whole

Crescendo, an after school program that was created to fulfill the Thesis/Creative Project requirement for Barrett, the Honors College, linked musical excellence with academic excellence in pursuit of social change for sixty of Tempe's underprivileged students in Thew Elementary School. This program focused on five main objectives: musical excellence through refined music education, academic excellence through tutorship, promotion of a positive self-image through community performances, development of strong communication skills through ensemble experience, and accessibility to students by providing the program free of cost. Students enrolled in this program were involved in musical rehearsal, college readiness sessions, a field trip to the Musical Instrument Museum, a music performance for the community, and academic assistance. Results of the overall effectiveness of the program were measured through a pre/post survey that was administered to the students and through dialogue with the teachers and parents of the participating students. The literary component of this project discusses the need for the integrations of outside arts organizations, like Crescendo, into schools, outlines the startup tasks of an arts education program (i.e. acquiring funding, designating volunteers, receiving permission, pinpointing a group of participants, etc.), offers before/after snapshot of the progress of the student participants, and provides a comparison to other programs of its type.