Take Two translates the day’s headlines for Southern California, making sense of the news and cultural events that affect our lives. Produced by Southern California Public Radio and broadcast from October 2012 – June 2021. Hosted by A Martinez.
As the school year draws to a close, many teachers, principals, parents and school board members have found themselves stuck in a whirlwind of confusion. The subject: arts access.
RELATED: School board members want answers on district's arts plan
Over the past few months, Los Angeles Unified School District administrators have put out pieces of an expansion plan — a budget outline here, new teacher assignments there — that seem to contradict each other and in some cases seem to reduce arts instruction time for some students, rather than follow the school board's mandate to increase it.
They announced plans to reduce elementary school orchestra classes from a year-long program to one semester — then reversed themselves. Shortly after, schools that had orchestra for years suddenly found out they'd been cut for next year.