United States Department of Education Jacob Javits Gifted and Talented Students Education Discretionary Grant Program

Talent Beyond Words and New Horizons allowed ArtsConnection to develop a comprehensive model for talent identification and development in the arts that helps students excel both artistically and academically. The Young Talent Program served as the basis for these initiatives. Through them, we were able to add new components to the program, develop arts-infused curricula with participating teachers, and research the effects of artistic programs on academic achievement. The methods developed and lessons learned through these initiatives now informs all of our work.

Talent Beyond Words (1990-92) was designed to identify and develop the artistic talents of economically and socially at-risk, inner city youth; to look at the effects of the program on students’ lives; to examine the factors that allowed these children to overcome the many obstacles they face; and to use the findings to suggest a model for talent development.

The Talent Beyond Words project identified over two hundred, third-grade students as musically talented through a talent identification process designed for the project. For three years, these children participated in a rigorous program of arts instruction. Teachers and parents learned to identify and support areas of strength exhibited by the students -- whether creative, emotional, behavioral, or intellectual. Students discovered a model for achievement based on hard work and discipline and found a positive identity within a supportive group. All of the students showed marked improvement in their academic standing and social development during the program.

New Horizons (1994-96) built on the work begun in Talent Beyond Words. The program provided ten schools with outstanding professional arts instruction in dance, theater, or music and support services for students and teachers. Through New Horizons, we:
  • Completed the development and testing of talent identification processes for dance, music, and theater.

  • Developed challenging, non-traditional curricula for intensive instruction in dance, music, and theater.

  • Developed M.A.G.I.C. (Merging Artistic Gifts into the Classroom), a unique program of academic tutoring that helps students transfer effective, arts-based learning strategies to their academic work.

  • Conducted research on how students learn in the arts and how they transfer learning strategies to the classroom.

  • Created professional development programs to help teachers learn to identify and support their students' artistic abilities; how to guide their students in using those abilities to improve classroom performance; and how to use arts processes and instructional methods in the classroom.

  • Expanded our school partnerships through programs that brought a deeper involvement of teachers, artists, school administrators, and parents into their children's art education.

  • Developed ways to help economically disadvantaged families take advantage of the vast educational and cultural resources found in New York City.

For information on how to obtain a copy of the complete, 355 page report for New Horizons, please write to us at: ArtsConnection, 520 Eighth Avenue, Suite 321, 3rd Floor, New York, NY 10018or e-mail us at: artsconnection@artsconnection.org



ArtsConnection was honored to be one of seven teams of researchers to take part in Champions of Change: The Impact of the Arts on Learning. The Champions of Change initiative was sponsored by the GE Fund and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation in partnership with the President's Committee on the Arts and Humanities. The full report of Champions of Change is now available.

The researchers looked at the impact of arts experiences on young people by examining a wide variety of arts-in-education programs. The research results provide clear quantitative and qualitative evidence of the value of arts education programs. Research teams included: 1) ArtsConnection and the National Research Center on the Gifted and Talented, University of Connecticut at Storrs (Barry Oreck, ArtsConnection, Susan Baum and Heather McCartney, UConn); 2) James Catterall of the Imagination Project at the University of California at Los Angeles; 3) the Center for Arts Education Research at Teachers College, Columbia University (Judy Burton, Rob Horowitz, and Hal Abeles).

ArtsConnection's research study, Artistic Talent Development for Urban Youth: The Promise and the Challenge, looked at the interrelationships between the obstacles students face in pursuing the arts, the factors which helped them to overcome those obstacles, and the overall impact of long-term involvement in the arts on the student's lives.

The two-year, longitudinal case-study examined the effects of talent development programs on a diverse group of New York City children and young adults. The study followed 23 students, ages 10-26, from their initial dance or music instruction in our Young Talent Program, through college and professional or semi-professional careers. A high percentage of the students were economically disadvantaged and attend or attended schools with no arts specialists. Over half of them had been labeled at-risk for school failure.

Data collected for this study -- a combination of interviews with students, parents, and families; observations in both school and professional settings; and a compilation of academic data -- showed that the existence of school-based arts programs that identify and develop students’ talents coupled with programs that support the arts instruction — particularly in schools and communities with little or no resources for the arts — were critical factors in determining a student's success and ability to pursue their artistic interests over time.

The full report of Champions of Change, is available online at http://artsedge.kennedy-center.org/champions. (This is a PDF version. An Adobe Acrobat Reader is needed to download the report's findings).

Copies may also be obtained by contacting the President's Committee on the Arts and Humanities by sending an e-mail request to pcah@neh.gov. Please provide your name, organizational affiliation and a mailing address. Requests for 25 copies or more will require a written explanation of how the copies will be disseminated to the following target audiences: decision makers who control education policy and/or funding or grant makers who support research. (Source/resource: Arts Education Partnership, http://www.aep-arts.org.

For more information about Talent Beyond Words, New Horizons, or the Champions of Change study, please contact our Carol Morgan, Deputy Director of Education
go back to top