Throughout the spring the group transitioned from a working group to a staging group. Dain Olsen, LAUSD, developed a website four our initiative. There is a lot of information housed there.
https://www.mediaartsedu.org/about
I was tasked with finding a student to create the graphic design layout for our Media Arts Initiative Document. We want to be able to distribute the document throughout the country, and we want it to look good, however, we don't have budget!
I was pleased to identify Nate Sherrod, an outstanding digital media student of mine at Messiah University. Nate has a an excellent design sense. He was searching for internship opportunities. We provided Nate with an internship while he will get credit as the designer of the pamphlet.
Nate created mockups for the group to choose from. We decided on a design and Nate s using the summer to finish laying out the document.
Meanwhile, the working group has transitioned to a staging group.
The idea is to plant seeds throughout the nation by state. Pennsylvania already has a robust cohort of media arts educators. They have attended our events cataloged at Media Arts Coalition of Educators. https://mediaartscoalitionofeducators.wordpress.com/
In Maryland, Prince George's County Schools are organizing to plan a professional development event and in California, a large group is forming within Los Angeles United School District.
The plan moving forward is to continue to hold in person and virtual professional development events for educators while seeking out leaders interested in investing time to form state associations.
The State Education Agency Directors of Arts Education has recently proposed a plan to help us attract membership with the National Associations of Dance, Art, Music, and Theater. The idea is to ask the associations to add a button on their website at annual registration to allow their members to elect membership with the Media Arts Association. This is brand new. We will see what happens as we navigate this path.
