Building Public Will for Arts Education
Eric Friedenwald-Fishman
President, Metropolitan Group
Access, Equity and Quality in Arts Learning Conference
June 20, 2009
Manifesto: This Matters
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Not reaching as far beyond the choir as we must
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For too long first budget cut, last investment made
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Existing frames undersell the power of arts Education
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New paradigm for social change (collective action,
dispersed innovation and shared responsibility)
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Information, Imagination and Ability to engage are critical
tools
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Sparks creativity and innovation
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Breaks barriers and connects across cultures
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Strengthens human capital
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Harness arts to create a just, equitable, sustainable and
meaningful society
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Must build public will to achieve new normative
expectation
To Achieve Access, Equity and
Equality:
• Need engagement of other committed
players
• Need real buy-in of numerous
stakeholders to drive scale implementation
(administrators, teachers, arts education
community, arts partners, etc.)
• Need awareness and and engagement of
larger community to ensure sustainability
(parents, advocates, voters and policy
makers)
What’s the problem?
• Arts education is viewed by many
Americans as a nicety, rather than a
necessity
• Arts education funding a roller coaster
and often the first thing to go
• Current frame(s)?
– Transactional and not strongly tied to core
values
– Seen as secondary & defensive
– Reflects lack of priority and buy-in by key
stakeholders
What’s the solution?
Build Public Will:
• Reframe arts education as a priority need that
makes individuals and communities stronger
– Change fundamental positioning of the arts
– Change public expectations
• Increase buy-in from internal and external
stakeholders
– Create engagement
– Motivate people to action
– Establish new norm
• Create relevancy and ownership for the new
frame by integrating grassroots outreach with
traditional media
What is Public Will?
•
Communication approach that builds public
support for long-term social change by:
– integrating grassroots outreach methods with
traditional mass media tools
– connecting an issue to the existing, closely held
values of individuals and groups
•
Results in long-term attitudinal shifts
– Manifested by individuals taking new or different
action
•
Achieved when community members and
thought leaders have galvanized around an
issue to create a new set of normative
expectations
Public Opinion vs. Public Will
• Public opinion—influencing specific
decisions and actions during a
limited time frame
• Public opinion—focus on mass
media as delivery mechanism
• Public opinion—narrows the
discourse
• Public will—long-term change built
over time that focuses on grassroots
engagement with mass media
support
Principles of Public Will Building
• Connecting through closely held
values
• Respecting cultural context
• Including target audiences in
development and testing
• Integrating grassroots and traditional
communication methods
Five Phases of Building Public Will:
Organizers and Audiences
• Framing the problem
• Building awareness
• Becoming knowledgeable/transmitting information
• Creating a personal conviction
• Evaluating while reinforcing
To download MG’s entire Public Will Framework, visit
www.metgroup.com.
Organizers
• Conducting research about the
problem
• Determining connection to values and
audiences for whom issue is relevant
• Framing the message
• Identifying potential change agents
and pathways to change
Audiences
• Moving from not aware of the problem
to early awareness that defines the
issue as one of relevance to them
Organizers
• Preparing: segmenting, learning about
and prioritizing audiences; crafting
messages; identifying communication
mediums
• Attracting early adopters and key
influencers
• Building awareness through grassroots
and traditional media
Audiences
• Participate in testing
• Gaining awareness and depth of
information through trusted
Organizers
• Transmitting information, with
specific information about how to
create desired changes
Audiences
• Hearing about the issue through
multiple channels and trusted
relationships with identification of
specific desired changes
Organizers
• Providing opportunities for
commitment and action
Audiences
• Gaining ownership
• Identifying specific actions to take
• Committing themselves
• Recruiting others
Organizers
• Evaluating effectiveness of tools
and messages
• Adapting as necessary
• Reinforcing audience choices
and encouraging champions
Audiences
• See messages that support
their choices
• See impact and value of action
• Rededicate to continue taking
What are the strategies to reach
this solution?
• Audience understanding
• Values identification
• Message framing
• Integrated outreach /
engagement
Audience Understanding
• Segmentation and
prioritization
• Influence mapping
• Needs identification
• Values identification
Identify the closely held values—
examples…
• Options and opportunity
• Achievement
• Innovation and adaptability
• Sense of belonging and sense of
community / identity (self-worth)
• Creativity and beauty
• Freedom (of expression/thought)
• Safety and stability
• Health (mind and spirit)
Reframing the message
Definition: Framing is the use of
images/words to intentionally associate an
issue with certain deeply held values,
thereby providing a context that
predisposes audiences to accept a
particular definition of the issue.
To move framing from nicety to necessity
arts education needs to:
Demonstrate relevancy to people’s
lives
• Identify benefits that reinforce values
and needs
•
Reframing the message—
current examples
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•
•
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Schools should nurture the whole child by
integrating the arts into teaching (Ford)
Integrating the arts help students become wellrounded (Ford)
Learning and participation in music, dance,
theater and the visual arts are vital to the
development of our children and communities
(AFTA)
Promote the essential role of the arts in the
learning and development of every child and in
the improvement of America’s schools (AEP)
The arts are an essential component of
education, and all children, not only those with
specific artistic talent, benefit from an
education in the arts including opportunities to
create, perform, and communicate through
various artistic media (NEA)
Reframing the message—
current examples
•
The arts are where learning starts, from a
child’s first exploration of meaning on a page
by finger painting to an adult's use of the arts to
develop, understand and communicate new
ideas. The fundamental way in which we
experience our world and express our selves is
through the arts, and arts education develops
essential skills and abilities for successful 21st
century citizens (ODOE)
•
We believe that art - and therefore art
education - means three things everyone wants
and needs Art means work. Art means
language. Art means values. (NAEA)
Reframing the message—some
concepts to consider
• Arts education opens opportunity
• Arts education: the spark of innovation
• Creativity is the foundation of
opportunity
• Imagination creates solutions
• Inspiring creativity and instilling
adaptability is a sound investment
• Arts education makes life better
• Create Opportunity/Create Prosperity
• Create links and connections in a multi-
cultural world
Integrated outreach/engagement
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Heal thyself—ensure that the choir learns and
owns the new music.
•
Create a fertile environment for discourse
(media and traditional outreach tools to “frame”
the message and set the terms of the debate).
•
Convert interested investors into activist
shareholders (start with thought leaders and key
influencers—the power of trusted relationships).
•
Ensure consistent reinforcement—use of
grassroots, media and other traditional tools to
reinforce the conviction of others and the
message frame.
This matters.
• We know the educational and cultural
benefits.
• We have seen nearly two decades of
definition being set by others.
• We know that the trade-offs are false
choices and that a “both/and” demand is
the pathway to educational success
• We must engage others and build the
public will to demand a new baseline.
Questions
and
Discussion
Case Study
Breakout
• What change do we seek – what action
do we need?
• Who has the power to create change?
(pick one key stakeholder group)
• What are their closely held values, drivers
and motivators?
• Ideas for powerful frames: What is the
value we deliver? What are the values we
advance?
• Messaging: What? So what? Now what?
Report Back
Metropolitan Group Agency Profile: What We
Do and Who We Help
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Practice Areas
– Strategic
Communication
– Resource
Development
– Multicultural
Communication
– Organizational
Development
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Focus Areas
– Children, Youth, Families
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and Education
Arts, Heritage and Culture
Social Justice and Human
Rights
Libraries and Literacy
Community and Economic
Development
Public Health
Environment and
Sustainability
Socially Responsible
Business
Foundations