{"id":5256,"date":"2011-02-14T13:37:00","date_gmt":"2011-02-14T13:37:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lbpost.com\/articles\/life\/arts-for-la-comes-to-long-beach\/"},"modified":"2011-02-14T13:37:00","modified_gmt":"2011-02-14T13:37:00","slug":"arts-for-la-comes-to-long-beach","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/hi-lo\/arts-for-la-comes-to-long-beach","title":{"rendered":"Arts For LA Comes To Long Beach"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"10:14am |<\/strong> Arts for LA<\/a> has been partnering with the LA County Arts Commission’s initiative, Arts for All, to create and present workshops in communities where their school districts had an Arts Education plan in place.  <\/p>\n

Their second series of workshops<\/a> will be focused on creating an effective arts advocacy infrastructure. Long Beach has been selected as one of the first cities (along with Pasadena and L.A.) to participate in these four part workshops, which begin this Wednesday, February 16th, at the Long Beach Nonprofit Partnership, located on the South West corner of Clark and Conant.  <\/p>\n

I spoke with Abraham Flores, Advocacy Field Manager for Arts for LA, who will be facilitating the workshops, and asked him about the first set, which started last year.<\/p>\n

Abraham<\/strong>: The first five workshops were conducted in Burbank, Santa Monica, Culver City, Paramount, and Montebello. The objective of the first workshops were to organize the community to support their School Districts’ Arts Education plan. The first workshops were focused on the local School Districts. The new series encompasses Arts in schools & civic life.<\/p>\n

Our new focus is to organize the community to support the entire local arts ecology. We are currently conducting the workshops in Pasadena & L.A. <\/p>\n

In terms of past success, we organized parents to save the Arts Coordinator position and Music teacher positions in Burbank. We helped organize parents to save music teachers in Santa Monica, and assisted in the passing of two measures in the last Santa Monica election.<\/p>\n

Sander<\/strong>: Why advocate for Arts Education programs, rather than an integration of arts learning into all the subject areas?<\/em><\/p>\n

Abraham<\/strong>: We actually advocate for both. Each district has its own arts education plan. Our objective is to get community support for that plan’s implementation.
That plan may call for integration and specialists.<\/p>\n

Sander<\/strong>: So, you’re not trying to shape the formulation of those plans, just support whatever plan the district has selected?<\/em><\/p>\n

Abraham<\/strong>: Yes, the districts that we originally worked in were all ‘Arts for All’ districts, meaning that they had worked with the LA County Arts Commission’s arts ed initiative to create an arts education policy and plan.<\/p>\n

Sander<\/strong>: Long Beach, though, has not yet adopted that plan, has it?<\/em><\/p>\n

Abraham<\/strong>: Correct, Long Beach is not an Arts for All district. Its not a uniform plan. Each district develops its own though a committee of local leaders.<\/p>\n

Sander<\/strong>: So, what is the plan that Long Beach community members should be supporting?<\/em><\/p>\n

Abraham<\/strong>: Long Beach is going to be a bit different. There is a Cultural Plan that was released by the Arts Council, and I believe LBUSD also has a plan, but the focus is going to be on the whole arts ecology. Things will not mirror the previous workshops. The objective of the workshops is to knit the arts community to regional efforts, as well to itself. We want build advocacy capacity, and increase civic engagement.<\/p>\n

Sander<\/strong>: Who is your ideal workshop participant?<\/em><\/p>\n

Abraham<\/strong>: We are striving for diversity. Our ideal group would be members from all of Long Beach’s ethnic communities and art disciplines, as well as parents who want arts education for all LBUSD students. Big institutions, small groups, members of grassroots organizations, and students, all with a passion for the arts and their community. We want to create the space for dialogue, as well as impart advocacy, organizing and campaign planning principles, and inform them of local government’s role in the arts. The workshops are designed to end with the production of advocacy plan. This plan is done through consensus.<\/p>\n

Sander<\/strong>: Aren’t diversity and consensus often mutually exclusive?<\/em><\/p>\n

Abraham<\/strong>: There are always common goals that are unearthed though the facilitation process. I use a facilitated planning method created by the Institute of Cultural Affairs. Its call the Technology of Participation. Its designed to achieve group consensus.<\/p>\n

Finding those common objectives and goals may be a challenge, but they do percolate to the top.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Arts for LA will be holding workshops designed to create an effective cultural and arts advocacy infrastructure, and improve community civic engagement. Abraham Flores, Advocacy Field Manager for Arts for LA, talks about the workshops, which begin this Wednesday, February 16th, at the Long Beach Nonprofit Partnership.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":70066,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"newspack_sponsor_sponsorship_scope":"","newspack_sponsor_native_byline_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_native_category_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_style":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_placement":"inherit","inline_featured_image":false,"newspack_ads_suppress_ads":false,"newspack_popups_has_disabled_popups":"","_EventAllDay":false,"_EventTimezone":"","_EventStartDate":"","_EventEndDate":"","_EventStartDateUTC":"","_EventEndDateUTC":"","_EventShowMap":false,"_EventShowMapLink":false,"_EventURL":"","_EventCost":"","_EventCostDescription":"","_EventCurrencySymbol":"","_EventCurrencyCode":"","_EventCurrencyPosition":"","_EventDateTimeSeparator":"","_EventTimeRangeSeparator":"","_EventOrganizerID":[],"_EventVenueID":[],"_OrganizerEmail":"","_OrganizerPhone":"","_OrganizerWebsite":"","_VenueAddress":"","_VenueCity":"","_VenueCountry":"","_VenueProvince":"","_VenueState":"","_VenueZip":"","_VenuePhone":"","_VenueURL":"","_VenueStateProvince":"","_VenueLat":"","_VenueLng":"","_VenueShowMap":false,"_VenueShowMapLink":false,"_":"","_author_alias":"","cap-aim":"","cap-description":"","cap-display_name":"","cap-first_name":"","cap-jabber":"","cap-last_name":"","cap-linked_account":"","cap-newspack_employer":"","cap-newspack_job_title":"","cap-newspack_phone_number":"","cap-newspack_role":"","cap-user_email":"","cap-user_login":"","cap-website":"","cap-yahooim":"","newspack_article_summary":"","newspack_email_html":"","newspack_email_type":"","newspack_featured_image_position":"","newspack_hide_page_title":"","newspack_hide_updated_date":false,"newspack_post_subtitle":"","newspack_show_share_buttons":"","newspack_sponsor_byline_prefix":"","newspack_sponsor_disclaimer_override":"","newspack_sponsor_flag_override":"","newspack_sponsor_only_direct":"","newspack_sponsor_url":"","newspack_article_summary_title":"Overview:","newspack_show_updated_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"newspack_spnsrs_tax":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-5256","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-hi-lo","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5256","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5256"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5256\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/70066"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5256"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5256"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5256"},{"taxonomy":"newspack_spnsrs_tax","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/newspack_spnsrs_tax?post=5256"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/esd\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=5256"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}