Assessing art accessibility
Walden Sullivan, Staff Writer
Have you ever wanted to take a class in the arts at Samo but been unable to fit it in? Well, you’re not alone. Students are faced with extreme advantages or disadvantages depending on their socio-economic status and so many other uncontrollable factors. There is not one specific way to change this, but many important steps can be taken to get us there.
With school telling you to take more classes to get into college but also telling you not to overwork yourself, managing classes can be very difficult. Personally, I have two electives (not including a language class or a PE period) and four academic classes during the school day. I have to take an academic class over the summer and learn a language online. I’m fortunate enough to have parents that can pay for programs outside of school, but not everyone has this luxury. If I could not do this, I would have to give up one elective AND take an AM class just to fit the school’s requirements.
While this system does “work”, students are not able to take classes that they are actually interested in. Samo does not offer enough free classes after school or over the summer, and there is not enough time in the school day, causing a serious equity issue.
There is also another very important issue regarding private lessons. Music and vocal lessons can be very expensive, and year after year they help people get into the top choirs, bands, and orchestras. This creates an unfair disadvantage to under-privileged students who can’t take lessons.
In my mind, there is not one way to solve this large issue. In order for everyone to have access to all classes, Samo would need to offer several free courses on campus during the year and over the summer, add a seventh period to the day and do many other things that are too difficult for the everyday student to understand.
There is one way that would solve the scheduling part of it, but currently, Samo is putting in too much effort to fix things that are not big issues at the moment. While they should be thinking about how to create a new schedule to help students, they are doing things like limiting what classes you can take over the summer. If the school could just add a seventh period to the school day, at least that part of the issue could be resolved.
Samo has quite a few issues, but this should be at the top of the priority list. The arts program brings so many people very important music education and joy, it is a program that deserves our full support.
This is an old baritone saxophone that is rented out to students in the band program.