NAAE celebrates 30 years

Update by Julie Dyson, Chair

To celebrate its 30th birthday, NAAE is launching its new website during UNESCO’s International Arts Education Week from 20-27 May, along with the 2019 revised edition of our seminal publication More Than Words Can Say – a view of literacy through the arts.

First published in 1998, the writers in this edition continue to advocate for arts literacy to stand alongside other more traditional forms of literacy as an important part of student learning. As Margaret Barrett says in her Music chapter:

In developing students’ capacity to participate fully in the life of work and the work of life, it is essential that we foster students’ skills, knowledge and understanding in the languages of all art forms.

The NAAE met in Sydney for its Annual General Meeting on 29 April, where I formally stepped down as Chair as from 1 January 2020.

NAAE members in 2003. Robin Pascoe (President), Kath Grushka (DECA), Julie Dyson (Ausdance), Stefan Kussy (CAMEO), Mark Bailey (Drama Australia), Jeff Meiners (Ausdance).

The Chair-elect is John Nicholas Saunders, the Drama Australia President and DA’s representative on NAAE, an experienced teacher and now Director of Education & Community Partnerships at Sydney Theatre Company. John will be an excellent Chair, and at NAAE’s request, I will continue to work with him as Immediate Past Chair in the coming years. Mary Mooney, representing Drama Australia, is our new Treasurer.

It has been a great privilege to chair the NAAE for the past two decades, especially during the period of intense advocacy and successful lobbying for the inclusion of five art forms in The Australian Curriculum: The Arts.

One of our major achievements has been to see the five arts forms of Dance, Drama, Media Arts, Music and the Visual Arts standing alone as separate subjects in the curriculum from F–10. The work of each Association on the NAAE has been central to this success, with our combined knowledge, skills and advocacy campaigns ensuring that the arts are now recognised throughout Australia as being worthy of study in the curriculum, along with all other subjects.