Arts Infusion

Arts InfusionThe Washoe County School District Arts Infusion Project, in collaboration with Sierra Arts and the University of Nevada, Reno, will impact five at-risk schools, affecting more than 165 educators and 3,000 students annually through high-quality professional development delivered to regular classroom, arts and ESL teachers.

Ultimately, the project’s replication throughout WCSD has the potential to involve more than 40 schools and benefit more than 21,000 students. The focus of the project grant is on using arts integration to improve student achievement and engagement in the core content areas and the use of music for language acquisition and development. Highly qualified teaching artists will coach teachers in the classroom, and train in after school Arts Academies, and ArtBox trainings.

Goals

  1. To provide teachers in four low-income elementary and one low-income middle school with high quality, sustained professional development to teach and instruct their students in the arts and arts standards.
  2. To further enhance student understanding and engagement in core content areas, such as math, literacy/language arts, science, and social studies through the integration of the arts and arts standards.
  3. To build capacity in the Washoe County School District (WCSD) along with its partners, to sustain the objectives of this project funding period by integrating and aligning the WCSD Arts Infusion Project with other district initiatives, and training other teachers.

Outcomes

  • Arts InfusionIncreased teacher confidence in their ability to integrate the arts and arts standards to improve instruction in core content areas.
  • Increased teacher confidence in their ability to use music vocabulary instruction to enhance language acquisition for LEP students.
  • Increased teacher skills and knowledge in the integration of the arts and arts standards to improve instruction in core content areas.
  • Increased inclusion of the arts in the educational lives of children by WCSD teachers earlier and with more sustainability.
  • Increased State Criterion Referenced Test scale scores in reading and math.
  • Implemented Arts in the Classroom resource library for use by WCSD teachers.
  • An increased capacity support for the Arts Infusion grant by providing information sessions on the project and training opportunities for WCSD teachers, related district initiative partners and community partners.