Music teacher Jessica Sheldon works with students at Stocklmeir Elementary School on Dec. 7, 2023, in Sunnyvale, Calif. The Cupertino Union School District uses Proposition 28 money to fund music programs. Photo by Aric Crabb/Bay Area News Group.
In Sunday’s (1/14) Mercury News (Bay Area, California), Elissa Miolene writes, “Across the state, Proposition 28 … will soon bring nearly $1 billion a year for arts and music to California’s schools. While some districts—like Cupertino Union and San Francisco Unified—began hiring new teachers … this year, others are still scrambling to choose the programs they’ll provide. But whether districts are ready or not, the windfall will be disbursed across California’s classrooms this February and schools will need to figure out how to spend it…. In November 2022, California voters overwhelmingly approved the proposition, which led to a new, ongoing state funding stream to support programs such as dance, music, theater, painting, photography, animation, film, and more. Those offerings are meant to be decided by school communities themselves, and staffed by either credentialed, certificated, or classified staff members…. ‘This will be a seismic shift in terms of what arts learning can look like in schools,” said Dominique Enriquez, the executive director of the Arts Education Alliance of the Bay Area, an organization supporting districts with their planning…. Preliminary estimates show that educational institutions will receive about $112 per student, plus an additional $85 for every economically disadvantaged student.”
