“Last fall, Luna, Bruno, Cesar and Kate enrolled in college immediately out of high school,” writes Dalouge Smith, chief executive officer of the Lewis Prize for Music and former head of the San Diego Youth Symphony and Conservatory, in Friday’s (4/9) San Diego Union-Tribune. “As Latinx youth who speak English as a second language, college was never a certainty for them. Their start was even more impressive in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, when enrollment from low income and majority non-White high school students declined significantly more than enrollment at high-income or low-minority-enrollment schools. Along with having engaged families, they shared the key experience of learning music. After handing them their first instruments 10 years ago, I have witnessed music’s role in helping them succeed. Their stories are affirmed by overwhelming evidence-based results showing music and arts education deliver substantial developmental and educational benefits…. The arts are the perfect complement to other subjects and an outlet for healthy expression. Research confirms that arts education contributes significantly to social-emotional well-being as well as college, career and citizenship readiness…. For the next generation to achieve its full potential … schools must be infused with the joy of the arts today.”
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