Students have the opportunity to discover, learn, and show their talents each day through fine arts, but unfortunately, schools across the country are slowly reducing their funding for these programs. Student involvement in fine arts is dropping, mainly because schools do not have the means to fund art classes.  More schools are taking away drama, visual art, and dance classes primarily due to the budget cuts. This is a great disappointment, because a lack of fine arts in school will take away the possibility of a student discovering new talents and pursuing his or her dreams.

Elementary schools with drama curriculums recently had a drop in funding from 20% to 4%. In addition, the executive director of the American Association of School Administrators expects the trend will continue with a greater drop in fine arts education within the next two years. Both students and teachers alike have complained about the budget cuts for fine arts. Teachers are losing their jobs and students are losing the ability to express themselves through an important art form.

I’ve participated in choir and drama through Horizon Honors’ performing arts department. These classes have impacted me, because I often refer to them as “no stress classes,” even though there are choir concerts to attend and drama monologues to perform. From personal experience, I must say that without the fine arts, I would be in the “depths of despair,” as famously said by Anne of Green Gables. Also, I feel that the amount of homework I have for choir and drama is unbelievably lax in comparison to other classes. The fine arts at Horizon Honors have provided me to discover talents, learn new experiences, and express myself in unique ways. These two classes have provided balance to my class workload while allowing me to explore my interests in singing and theatre.

The arts have given me the ability to improve my skills and discover new talents. This is a reason as to why schools should support students who want to continue with the fine arts. The fine arts classes can help students to learn, be creative, and display their talents. I believe that fine arts play a critical role in a student’s education. The fine art experience plays an important role in the development of a child’s talents, and the loss of the fine arts leads to a lack of creativity in school. These are students’ talents we are talking about; they should not have to give them up. Even if a student feels they have no talent in fine arts, that doesn’t mean they should just give up. Pursuing a talent means to engage in it and work hard to improve your skills.

I believe that schools should develop well-rounded students through fine arts classes in addition to traditional core classes. I believe the central importance of an education is for the student to discover and learn. The fine arts play an important role in developing well rounded, talented students, and shouldn’t be overlooked.