Public arts funding aimed to benefit the youth

By Hillary Rodham Clinton

When you think of the arts in America, what first pops into your mind? If you're like most of us, you probably have an image of adults -- wealthy adults -- who have the time and money to go to the opera, attend a play or concert, or spend hours browsing through a museum.

In fact, the greatest beneficiaries of public funding for the arts are America's children. Through federal support of local arts agencies and community groups, hundreds of thousands of children each year are able to discover the joy, discipline and self-confidence that comes from their own artistic and creative expression.

That's why current arguments about limiting public funding for the arts are so misguided -- and short-sighted. Learning to paint, dance, write poetry, act, sing or play an instrument gives children reasons to believe in themselves and their own futures.

For many children from impoverished backgrounds, exposure to the arts can literally mean the difference between a life of accomplishment and one of hopelessness and failure. This idea is not my own; a recent report issued by the President's Committee for the Arts and Humanities, Coming Up Taller, identified cultural programs that provide young people with safe and productive alternatives to crime, violence, gangs, drugs and other disturbing elements of popular culture.

One of those is the Manchester Craftsmen's Guild in Pittsburgh. It is a testament to the power of the arts to transform children's lives. The organization, which is supported by both the National Endowment for the Arts and donations from corporate and private foundations, trains inner-city schoolchildren in ceramic art and photography and opens their ears to world-class music.

But its students learn much more than how to shape clay, take pictures and appreciate jazz. They leave the guild knowing that they have the potential and tools to become successful and productive citizens. Eighty percent of the guild's students go on to college.

I met Bill Strickland, the founder of the Manchester Craftsmen's Guild, last month at a White House ceremony to celebrate arts programs that serve "at-risk" youth. Bill was himself headed in a downward spiral, he says, until an inner-city art teacher introduced him to "ceramics, jazz, and beautiful objects" and taught him that "having ideas had value."

"I learned that I could achieve recognition from my peers through creative activity," he says.

Determined to give other children the same opportunities he enjoyed, he founded the guild. "The antidote for these 'at-risk' children, we have discovered, is to surround them with good architecture, good food, good artists and good teachers who are allowed to function in well-equipped environments and who will not accept anything less than the best that the human imagination can provide," he says.

Hundreds of young people have passed through the guild's doors during the past nine years. In that time, the guild has never had a police call, a fight, or a drug or alcohol-related incident. Although it's located in one of Pittsburgh's most depressed neighborhoods, there are no bars on the windows, security cameras in the building or guards at the door.

"Given the current enthusiasm for building prisons to lock people up," Bill said, "I would challenge them to build centers like this one to set children free."

While those who oppose public funding for programs like Manchester Craftsmen's Guild have not succeeded in abolishing the National Endowment for The Arts and other federal cultural programs, their crusade will continue. And that means that all of us who care about the arts -- and what the arts can do for children -- have to work as hard as we can to protect a 30-year bipartisan commitment to making the arts more accessible to more Americans.

That historical commitment represents a belief that the arts have the power not only to improve our aesthetic surroundings but to improve our society as well. Learning about culture, after all, is fundamental to understanding our own heritage and the diverse world in which we live.

I find it particularly ironic that those who bemoan America's loss of values (particularly those arising from Western civilization) are often the first to recommend cutting public funds for the arts. Without federal support for arts programs, countless children would never be exposed to Sophocles, Shakespeare or Mozart -- or the painting of Georgia O' Keeffe, the music of Wynton Marsalis and the dance of Arthur Mitchell.

Today, funding the NEA costs every American 32 cents a year, less than the price of a candy bar. For those who wonder whether it is money well spent, ask yourself this question: Would you rather see a child pick up a paintbrush or a pistol? Would you rather see a child pick up a guitar or a gun ?.

-- Creators Syndicate