Team+1

Liz Slusher- Finland Jordan Davis- Italy Yu Gu- Russia Kaitlin Morton- Mexico Meghan Rohen- Canada Mariah Wielgos- Kenya Casey Droste- New Zealand
 * Team 1: **

It seems that 4 out of 7 countries (Canada, Russia, Finland and New Zealand) integrate arts into academic education system well. Most people in these 4 countries think art is beneficial to country's development as well as children's creative thinking. Based on the research done by Creative New Zealand, "73 percent of us agree our communities would be poorer without the arts", while there are 56% of administrators in Finland believe that “there should be more arts education in comprehensive schools.” We can see how people in these countries view the arts and understand why arts education is strongly supported in these nations. In the early stage of education in Italy, i.e. "The Epochal Reggio Emilia" program, it also share the same objective of stimulating children's creativity and imagination by encouraging them to learn about the things they are interested in with other developed nations.
 * The shared ideas, practices, and approaches: **

-Yu Gu

Every country varies in their educational programs and curriculum that they offer. Finland for example offers equal education for all students in all core subjects and they must include arts and crafts, music and physical education. However Mexico, offers little to no art programs as a part of their curriculum this is due to a lack of enrollment and funding. Finland has a better economy than Mexico, allowing for them to put more money into their education system. In Russia there are two main forms of children and youth education programs. The first one is "formal", it is controlled by the government. The second is "informal" which is additional art education chosen by the student outside the classroom. Kenya however is very different from Russia and Finland in the sense that art is apart of the education but not a major focus. They also have a lack of resources to offer. Education varies on culture, size and growth of the economy and the type of school.
 * Differences: **

-Jordan Davis

 As I was looking through the country profile pages, I noticed that there were numerous differences among the countries when referring to the arts. In Mexico, there is barely any support or requirements of art education in their curriculum. Mexico is a country that is facing poverty; there is not a lot of money or resources to provide students an adequate arts education. Kenya was similar, in the aspect that they are a country that is facing poverty. Although this is true, Kenya is still able to offer some arts programs to their students. I think that Kenya understands the importance of incorporating art into education. It is all about how the country decides to prioritize their money. It is difficult for countries, that are not financially stable, to provide art education. Those countries are struggling to provide the core subjects. Countries such as Finland and Canada, which would be considered more developed countries, are able to integrate arts into the curriculum, by making them a requirement for the students. It seems that all the countries that our group studied believe that art plays a major role in their culture, but I did find it interesting how the countries actually showed how art was important, by implicating it into the schooling systems. Russia is a country that finds art very important to their students' success, which is why art is part of the requirements. Mexico seems to be the Lone Ranger, in that, all the other countries that we studied, found that arts in education is vital to a students' success. I find that very surprising, just because when I learned about Mexico, while I was in school, it seemed that art played a major part in their everyday social lives and culture. It seems like a country that believes in the arts, should be able to make room for it in their curriculum.

-Meghan Rohen

<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">There is a wide variety of the availability of art programs in schools between countries, as noted above. I noticed that the countries that were very developed and were considered to be wealthy, tried to incorporate art into the schools, such as Finland. I assumed that the countries that were not as wealthy or had other social and political conflicts would be similar to each other. However, this was not the case. Kenya and Mexico were similar in the fact that many students live in poverty and in the case of Kenya rely on a lot of volunteer organizations to build schools. Even though Kenya doesn't have a large degree of programs they still have some art programs and organizations to help students to learn about the arts and promote creativity. This differed from Mexico, who is using funding and political power to focus on other issues in the country such as violence, or aspects of education such as preventing students from dropping out. Kenya was able to find the resources and understand the value of arts education where as Mexico seems to not have either found a way to incorporate arts, or does not yet feel this is the most important issue at this time.This shows that funding is not the only thing that determines whether the arts will be in schools or not. I found it interesting that Mexico and Kenya both think of art as an important part of their culture but they differ in arts education. In this sense, Mexico differs from Finland, Russia, Canada, and New Zealand who all believe that art play an important role in education.

<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">-Kaitlin Morton


 * <span style="color: #800080; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 150%;">Similarities: **

<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">There are many similarities between the education systems and how they view art based education. Like Finland, the "Mask" program in Kenya also viewed art as a way to enhance the industrial economy. In some cases, as in Mexico and Kenya, the governments are stepping in to improve education within school systems, especially the arts education. In both Mexico and Kenya, tradition plays a major role in their culture and like in Kenya, art is not a significant part of Mexico's education system. New Zealand, like Kenya also uses organic things such as wood and bones from animals to create art. Free primary schooling is offered in most of countries. Although each country has their own view on art based education, there are subtle similarities between most of the countries.

<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">-Mariah Wielgos

**<span style="color: #800080; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 150%;">What Surprised Us: **

<span style="color: #000000; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">I found it surprising that in the comparison with this wide range of countries and variety of people that much was not different. Out of the 7 countries 4 of them had similar arts education and 3 of them were different. Finland and Italy were two of the different countries and in a good way. I think it is important to know that only one group member went to school outside the United States. Finland and Italy were compared to the United States and blew them out of the water with their programs, this part was not so surprising because I feel that the U.S. art programs are lacking. I think it was surprising to realize how many countries were similar to the U.S. because of this lacking program system. What stuck out the most was that Mexico was almost totally lacking arts programs but Kenya was not. Both of these countries have struggles but obviously Kenya being a 3rd world country is not expected to have such a program as Mask. Seeing a place like Kenya strive to excellence that can exceed that of the United States really made me question our public schools and governments involvement in schools. Looking at the artists shared for each country was fun and educational, personally I did not know of many. I think this aspect of research shows how little we know about the arts in other countries, there are the obvious ones sure but this shows how famous you can be and still have someone who has no clue who you are! I was expecting population to have a large impact on the differences between countries but with a range of 4 million- 138 million the only trend I could find was that Italy, Mexico, and Russia (although similar to China is not similar to the U.S.A.) were all at the top of the population list and would all be considered different from the U.S. but not all in a good way. Mexico was different in the sense that they do not have a focus on the arts barley at all due to their current war struggles. **<span style="color: #800080; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 150%;">Flags of Our Countries: ** media type="youtube" key="luluQAJaUxQ" height="315" width="560" align="center"

<span style="color: #000000; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">-Casey Droste

**<span style="color: #800080; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 150%;">Cultural Aspects that May Impact Creative Expression: **
<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">I think some countries focus more on certain cultural aspects than others. For example, in Kenya music is an important aspect of the culture and heritage. It is so important that the Department of Culture has actually been working to create programs in order to protect the importance of Kenyan music. Although these efforts have not impacted the music education in Kenyan schools, it may some day, as music is a large factor in the country’s culture. While music is an important aspect of the culture in Kenya, other countries’ cultures focus on the visual arts. Italy is known for its’ architecture and monuments. It is home to the innovative Colosseum, the Spanish Steps, the Trevi Fountain, as well as the Leaning Tower of Pizza. Italy is also known for their Reggio inspired early childhood education facilities. These schools emphasize the importance of creative exploration. This could have been easily inspired by the creative structures that the country is known for. With these two examples it is evident that the cultural aspects that are emphasized can impact the creative expression and arts education in a country.

<span style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS',Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">-Liz Slusher