Professional Development for our members is a key component of the DC Collaborative’s continuing education agenda for teachers, arts educators, and arts organization staff.
Workshops and Convenings
Through frequent discussions and special workshops, the education staff of arts organizations learn about specifics of DCPS content standards and other curriculum requirements as well as other pressing topics in arts and humanities education to be able to adapt their offerings to better meet classroom needs and to plan and strategize around approaches to leading the education improvement agenda.
Other Initiatives
The Arts Education Initiative focused on the role of professional development in ensuring the effective integration of arts across the curriculum. In 2005, in partnership with the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities and The Ford Foundation, the DC Collaborative established the Arts Education Initative (AEI). The AEI was designed to develop, pilot, refine and adopt a model process for collaboration in DC public and public charter schools. The goal of this project was to enhance student learning by integrating arts across the curriculum and increasing community support for arts education.
It remains a priority for the DC Arts and Humanities Education Collaborative to disseminate findings as well as develop user-friendly resources to help bridge the research-to-practice continuum. The DC Collaborative synthesized third-party evaluations and developed case studies and issue briefs about the AEI work so that others could benefit from identified best practices and lessons learned. The DC Collaborative developed a series of publications:
- Reflections of a School Taking Flight Through Arts Integration: Peabody Early Learning Center
- Arts Integration Advances Literacy
- Arts Integration Creates Positive School Climates
- Arts Integration Enhances Student Content Mastery and Academic Skills Development Across the Curriculum
