Richard Baker - Department of Education of the State of Louisiana
Richard Baker is a member of the Department of Education of the State of Louisiana, where he is responsible for standards enforcement in arts education in middle & secondary public schools.
In this presentation given at Loyola University, New Orleans, music educator and education advocate Richard Baker introduces Act 175, a piece of legislation designed to provide a framework for the funding, support, and analysis of arts education in Louisiana public schools. Baker discusses how the act was framed and drafted, what the state seeks to measure in terms of classroom performance, how widely the sample curricula have been adopted thus far, how standards compliance is enforced, and some of the issues and challenges that confront anyone working on large-scale arts education initiatives.
In this segment from a presentation at Loyola University, New Orleans on Louisiana’s Act 175 (which mandates arts education in Louisiana public schools), educator and advocate Richard Baker introduces himself and the legislation, and discusses the origins and motivation behind its drafting and passage.
In this segment from a presentation at Loyola University, New Orleans on Louisiana’s Act 175 (which mandates arts education in Louisiana public schools), educator and advocate Richard Baker discusses the role of educators from various fields (writing, elementary education, etc.) in drafting the legislation, state curriculum, and sample lesson plans.
In this segment from a presentation at Loyola University, New Orleans on Louisiana’s Act 175 (which mandates arts education in Louisiana public schools), educator and advocate Richard Baker discusses how the drafting committee constructed the benchmarks for success mandated in the final legislation.
In this segment from a presentation at Loyola University, New Orleans on Louisiana’s Act 175 (which mandates arts education in Louisiana public schools), educator and advocate Richard Baker discusses some of the concrete benefits that the act has had on arts education in the state since its passage, and raises questions about funding and how other states in similar situations have sought funding for their education programs. He also discusses how a combination of grassroots and legislative action can achieve measurable results in improving arts education.
In this segment from a presentation at Loyola University, New Orleans on Louisiana’s Act 175 (which mandates arts education in Louisiana public schools), educator and advocate Richard Baker discusses how Louisiana defines “music literacy” and explains how Act 175 helps educators develop music literacy among schoolchildren who participate in the recommended curriculums.
In this segment from a presentation at Loyola University, New Orleans on Louisiana’s Act 175 (which mandates arts education in Louisiana public schools), educator and advocate Richard Baker answers an audience question about metrics – how to gather data on the spread of the curriculums laid out in Act 175 and assess how widely and deeply the benchmarking and standards have been adopted.
In this segment from a presentation at Loyola University, New Orleans on Louisiana’s Act 175 (which mandates arts education in Louisiana public schools), educator and advocate Richard Baker answers an audience question about how the act is funded, and about how Louisiana seeks to ensure that money allocated to a parish or school district for arts education is actually used for that purpose.
