Chattanooga State Fine Arts Program Problems in creating fine arts SLOs The discussion of fine arts learning

objects quickly revolved around the issue of whether the notion of learning objectives should be externally or internally governed. Clearly, because there are a blend of programs, the division has wisely chosen to make many of the learning objectives things that you determine as departments and as a unit. You sped copious amounts of time justifying that decision and frankly that time is wasted. Like a good child always trying to prove their worth to negligent parents, you are chasing a dragon that neither cares or regards such efforts with much compassion. I believe the learning objectives and outcomes only exist to make the division talk to themselves and to discus issues of where the division sees itself and its learning community. I doubt if TBR cares much what they are, so long as they help you do a better job serving your learning class. SLOs and Tracking students: the frontier A more valid form of soul searching occurs in the introduction to your study that concludes that you spend little time in recording student successes and failures following graduation. We are all guilty of that. This is not unusual. All schools have an out of sight, and out our mind attitude. However, I think social media and digital technology can help us all there, and we can all correct that by using social media to provide at least some strong anecdotal feedback. Be friends with your students as well as mentors. Produce a professional linkedin, myspace, or facebook page that allows for updates and longer missives from your peers and students. Invite everyone to join and be a fan. Assign collection of facebook data to someone in your division. Rotate it. Try to keep track of who is writing to you and make sure you target their commentary to professional data about their career. Create a subpage or blog where they can register and keep up with you. Twit them and get them to follow your department and track their career through weekly or monthly updates. Ask students to do this for a year after leaving. Provide them with different pages that provide each class with its own page. Sort of use it as a yearly yearbook for your classes in your programs. Now is a good time to start for film and dance because they are new and those students will want a sense of community. If you think, this work is non-academic, tabular and more like administrative record keeping, it is, but it is necessary and an easy way to keep up with graduates. They are more likely to use social networking than to respond to a form letter or even email. By the way, emails are still good, but my students think of email, as communication for old people. Individual SLOs and Silos Listening to the discussion of SLOs I was thinking you have real SILOS in your departmental divisions. We do too, but I have been working intently to get the professors to think more as a unit and less as individual programs. Have you ever considered combining your professional Certificate degrees into a professional fine arts certificate to increase numbers, keep accrediting agencies from looking at your low number programs, (not that that seems to be an issue for the pro acting program) and provides you with a means to combine your learning objectives. Looking at appendix three and seeing the SLOs you arrived at for each discipline, there is much overlap. Clearly there isa struggle between the notion of scholar artists and simply artists that are judged by their professional acumen. My background (which is pretty irrelevant) was at UVa and there the notion of the gentleman scholar in the Jeffersonian tradition was stressed. I suppose the institution determined that if the students did not become great artists, at least they would be skillful aesthetes. It seems like that is a sticky point for these programs. I would contend that an analytical/evaluative/general education component to even the purely professional amongst your programs would aid the artistry of all the programs. It would seem helpful to go back to the table and take all disciplines together and seek to create a series of slos you could all embrace.

For example, if I was writing for the group I would start with: 1.Students frame cogent oral and written critiques of works that are Evaluative, analytical and illustrate an understanding of primary works in the field/discipline. Such a statement could serve a symphony, a play or a dance piece. Again, that sort of understanding of issues might be as employable as the act of working in the field. Lots of people are technicians, but not all technicians can explain their work. 2. Students respond to global cultural forces in the creation of personal, evocative, performative media. Such a statement entails that the work has breadth and understanding of other cultures (big for tbr outcomes) and that it expresses what many of your departments desire: a sense of personal vision. 3.Students can craft a manifesto and objective critique of their own work that places their work in a larger context while still remaining objective and open to criticism of their work. Thus artists must have a rational and intellectual grasp of their craft and how to express this powerfully, but they must also remain clear, receptive to criticism and focused on their audiences and patrons who provide the lifeblood of their work. Such a statement focuses on intellectual and objective processes, and the ability to respond to critiques which I assume are mandatory in your labs and classes. Simultaneously, such self-awareness should not translate into internalized arrogance and the students need to be redirected outward to audiences and respected peers, mentors, critics and colleagues. Finally, there is more commonality in your disciplines than any discipline realizes. The media is different and approaches are different, but you could be sharing to a greater extent to gain more fully rounded and (at least internally) successful student/artists. Realize that the odds against artistic success, regardless of the individual students talent, are astronomical, and the sense of self, the ability to be self-critical, the ability to have a strong statement of principles (a manifesto), a relationship to the world, global cultures, and the facility to express oneself with ease in a variety of formats are lessons that go beyond the nuts and bolts of an individual discipline. These general ed. Objectives, while seemingly superfluous in an aesthetic training program, may last longer than any particular discipline skills that ebb and flow with new technologies and new popular interests. Learning Objectives questions: 1.Student learning objectives were described having been revised in 2002. Shouldnt learning objectives be revised on a more equitable schedule that once every eight years? 2.It sounds from the narrative that students in non-fine arts majors might actually get a more of the TBR learning objectives in fine arts disciplines than fine arts majors. Why is exposure to the same learning objectives for general education students not mandatory for students in the arts? 3.What would be a better mechanism for insuring that learning objectives were met if not impeded by the restrictions of articulation agreements? 4.Despite the claim the SLOs are more narrowly defined by the departments, lots of the programs seem to avoid the broad overall humanistic objectives for very narrowly defined artistic competencies sort of like trade school specifically targeted job skills. How do you justify the sacrifice of those humanistic understandings. Dont you think the general understanding of the arts is as important as just painting, just piano or just acting. Is practice more important than understanding.

5.Schools can create whatever SLOs they want for AAS, but as these are AS/AA programs do these competencies reflect what a general education community college should be doing? Curriculum After looking at the course descriptions, even the new programs seem to have well developed courses. The breadth and depth of your catalog of courses is greatly impressive. 26 courses in art. A full two year curriculum in photography and sculpture make your program the envy of the state. Even the comparatively new dance program has five fine new courses. Music is similarly diverse and impressive with a wide range of discipline courses and a strong theory and ear-training program to match it. The theatre program is clearly programmed for a professional experience and the film program has courses specifically geared to professional applications in the technical aspects of the field. Some things immediately occur. Is there enough work in the arts to generate enough capable students to success to continue any such programs. I think in my FA program there were only two of us who happened to obtain academic jobs. The rest went into other fields. I think professional and semi-rpo programs are good at he undergraduate level, but I question if the value of professional programs is to the students to the seriousness of the profession. Our programs are not professional communication, acting or art programs, but we have occasional artists, actors, and communicators that come through our door. Considering the little amount of work in the fields, maybe we should gear ourselves to programs that dont exist in large numbers, or to programs that can offer fuller employment. I know that you have a graphics program and an art program. I assume that art exists in a different sphere than graphics, but I also assume that graphics has more immediate professional applications. Clearly the film program is not essentially about film production but about supporting professional film companies that might be working in the area. Laudable and commendable. Do the students continue to make films on their own? Would there be a market for a film criticism program where students could study film aesthetics and write about it. Even in todays saturated internet market, I imagine there more people writing about films than making them. In theatre there is a mass of courses in professional acting, but what about courses in theatre management for people starting little theatres. performance mangement courses for people managing other peoples careers. What about arts entrepreneurship? Could you be starting companies in towns without them? I suppose the overriding question is, are there other ways to refocus these programs to give students more career options than musical performance, acting, film crewing, dancing in a theme park, or working for an advertising company? I think there are other focuses and your school is centrally located to provide training for a vast variety of nearby locales in Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee, and the Carolinas. You have a wide reach and couold create perhaps new distinctive programs that might not have been tried in that region. Programs like rural film cooperatives. Sculpture gardens for the Southeast. Community theatre programs for isolated communities. Net theatres. There are lots of ideas to explore. Curriculum questions: 1.It seemed the difference between external and internal forces in the creation of an art curriculum seemed arbitrary and forced. Why didnt the external forces that resulted in the transferable courses most naturally also serve the artistic and personal growth of the students already in classes in art. In other words, what was wrong with basic design, and life drawing? Arent those pretty basic clases for artistic expression and teaching fundamentals, anyhow? 2. I like the idea of a professional actor training program but what is the point of a New York centered program when there is only one New York and your school is 1000 miles away. Why not train for something more reasonable like regional theatre or media acting and not New York stage.

3. Again there seems to be an insistence in suggesting that outer forces and inner forces are at war? Cant you obtain the outer goal of transference of courses and fulfill the artistic ambitions at the same time? 4. Curriculum ideas seems driven by professional need and by external forces. Which is more important? Professional application or compliance with transfer agreements? What do your students think is more important? Where does the value of student fulfillment by practicing the art come into the mix. Considering the job prospects for most actors, filmmakers, and musicians, shouldnt personal satisfaction play a larger role in curriculum decisions for the students? How would you measure that and how might you argue for the programs success by that measure? 5.The authors seem to be quite compelled by external forces and the antithetical nature of that purpose seems to fly in the face of the deeply internal reasons for why people choose an artistic and often an impoverished (at least financially impoverished) life in the first place? Where is the destiny of a life in art in your considerations. What role does the maturation of the artist play in your curriculum decisions.