Bill Text: HI HR164 | 2022 | Regular Session | Introduced

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Bill Title: Urging The Department Of Education To Increase Access To Arts And Cultural Education In Public Schools To Address Learning Loss Caused By The Covid-19 Pandemic.

Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Democrat 3-0)

Status: (Introduced - Dead) 2022-03-31 - Report adopted; referred to the committee(s) on FIN with none voting aye with reservations; none voting no (0) and Representative(s) Eli, Hashem, D. Kobayashi, Ohno excused (4). [HR164 Detail]

Download: Hawaii-2022-HR164-Introduced.html

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HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES	H.R. NO.	164
THIRTY-FIRST LEGISLATURE, 2022
STATE OF HAWAII

HOUSE RESOLUTION

 

 

urging the department of education to increase access to arts and cultural education in public schools to address learning loss caused by the covid-19 pandemic.

 

 

 

     WHEREAS, providing a well-rounded education to all public school students advances the economic and social health of Hawaii; and

 

     WHEREAS, art, music, and cultural curricula constitute important parts of a well-rounded education that address the developmental needs of the whole child; and

 

     WHEREAS, in 2013, researchers in the Department of Education Reform at the University of Arkansas found that instruction in visual arts led to gains in critical-thinking skills; and

 

     WHEREAS, according to a 2014 study performed by Lois Hetland and Ellen Winner of the Harvard Graduate School of Education, education in music and drama shows a generalizable causal relationship to increases in verbal achievement and spatial reasoning; and

 

     WHEREAS, Paul T. Sowden, a professor of psychology at the University of Winchester in England, has noted that arts and cultural education develop children's capacity for collaboration, creativity, and intellectual inquiry; and

 

     WHEREAS, research performed by Mariale Hardiman, Director of the Neuro-Education Initiative at the Johns Hopkins School of Education, has shown that students with access to arts and cultural content are more adept at retaining instruction regardless of subject matter, demonstrating that arts and cultural instruction could help to mitigate learning loss; and

 

     WHEREAS, a study conducted by researchers at the University of Missouri and University of Texas A&M found that a substantial increase in access to arts education led to a 3.6 percentage point reduction in disciplinary infractions, an improvement of thirteen percent on standardized writing scores, and an increase of eight percent in measures of compassion for others; and

 

     WHEREAS, in an article published by the Brookings Institution, the same researchers concluded that the arts "challenge us with different points of view, compel us to empathize with others, and give us the opportunity to reflect on the human condition"; and

 

     WHEREAS, the researchers further found that "[a]mong adults, arts participation is related to behaviors that contribute to the health of civil society, such as increased civic engagement, greater social tolerance, and reductions in other-regarding behavior"; and

 

     WHEREAS, access to arts education has a positive impact on social and emotional learning and academic performance across subject areas; and

 

     WHEREAS, during the COVID-19 pandemic, Hawaii's public school students experienced "learning loss", with the Department of Education reporting in 2021 that just thirty-two percent of public school students were proficient in math, a twenty-six percent drop from 2019; and

 

     WHEREAS, the Department of Education also reported that language arts proficiency dropped to fifty percent from fifty-four percent and science proficiency dropped from forty-four percent to thirty-five percent during the same time period; and

 

     WHEREAS, the Department of Education received hundreds of millions of dollars in Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief funds to mitigate the impact of COVID-19 on school communities and student achievement; now, therefore,

 

     BE IT RESOLVED by the House of Representatives of the Thirty-first Legislature of the State of Hawaii, Regular Session of 2022, that the Department of Education is urged to increase access to arts and cultural education in public schools to address learning loss caused by the COVID-19 pandemic; and

 

     BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that certified copies of this Resolution be transmitted to the Chairperson of the Board of Education and Interim Superintendent of Education.

 

 

 

	OFFERED BY:	_____________________________

Report Title: 

DOE; Learning Loss; Arts and Cultural Education