Leveraging Federal Grants to Sustain Your Arts Education Funding: Understanding the ED’s New Guidance

In October 2024, the US Department of Education (ED) issued its “Dear Colleague” Letter to Chief State School Officers on Arts Education, providing a clear and specific roadmap for local educational agencies to leverage federal resources to support arts education programs in schools. This guidance marks an inflection point for arts education because district leaders and arts and cultural organizations should no longer rely on federal discretionary grants specifically for the arts. The silver lining, if there is one, is that they have permission to use a wide range of federal funding streams to support arts programming.

This guidance is largely driven by the powerful arts advocacy coalition Arts Alliance and the expanded definition of what makes a “well-rounded education.” Defined in the 2015 Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), a comprehensive, rigorous K-12 education considers arts programming essential to holistic learning that sets students up for success in the 21^st century. As stated by Deputy Education Secretary Cindy Marten in the October ED letter, “Arts education—including dance, media arts, music, theater, and visual arts—is key to equitable access to a well-rounded education and central to our shared commitment to ensure every child receives high-quality instruction that prepares them to be active, engaged, and lifelong learners.” 

Few would argue the benefits of a “well-rounded education.” However, the re-appearance of this guidance document from the ED (issued in its original form in 2013) signals a possible pivot away from an explicit, dedicated funding stream for arts education grants that has supported under-resourced school districts in their efforts to develop, expand, and replicate effective arts education programs and practices. In the absence of these discretionary grant programs, arts educators must now fight harder for a piece of the K-12 education pie. We hope our take on the path forward regarding the federal guidance will help you sustain your arts education programming.

Federal Discretionary Grants for Arts Education: End of an Era?

Funding under ESSA was designed to promote arts education for “disadvantaged students and students who are children with disabilities.” Starting in 2001, the US Department of Education ran discretionary grant competitions to bring arts education to life in districts, schools, and classrooms. These grants included: 

• Professional Development for Arts Educators (PDAE, as well as Professional Development for Music Educators – PDME). From 2001 through 2017, these four-year grants provided support for the implementation of high-quality model professional development programs for arts educators and other instructional staff in the areas of dance, music, theater, media arts, and visual arts. Appropriations for these awards totaled $87,296,556 over the life of the program.
• Assistance for Arts Education Model Development and Dissemination (AEMDD). From 2004 until 2018, the AEMDD program supported increased access to standards-based arts education and the development and dissemination of instructional materials and arts-based programming to improve students’ academic performance, including their knowledge and skills in creating, performing, and responding to the arts. The Department awarded $122,660,091 in four-year grants under this program. 
• Assistance for Arts Education (AAE). This last incarnation of ED discretionary grant programs for arts education ran one competition in 2021. There were a total of 27 five-year grant awards totaling $17,176,836.

In combination, these programs provided over $227 million for arts education programs serving students in grades K-12 in high-poverty districts across the country during their 20+ year tenure.  

The future of federal discretionary grant programs specifically targeted to support arts education is uncertain. There has not been a discretionary grant competition since 2021.¹ And now, there are even larger questions about the future of federal support for education writ large. However, as the Dear Colleague letter spells out, the funding streams that have been codified into the ESSA can and should be leveraged to support a myriad of arts education initiatives.

The Federal Funding Road Map for Arts Education

As researchers and evaluators who have studied the benefits of arts education programs in school and community settings for the past 20+ years, we strongly encourage policymakers and educational leaders to take full advantage of the recently issued guidance to sustain the vital role that arts education has played in leveling the playing field for young people in under-resourced schools and communities and helping them develop to their fullest potential.  

With these goals in mind, as laid out in the guidance letter, education leaders can leverage the following existing ED funding streams to support arts education:    

• Title I Part A. Can be used to bolster arts education programs as a strategy to support Title I students in meeting States’ challenging academic standards.
• Title II Part A. Can be used to provide professional development to educators on arts-focused concepts and approaches to arts instruction, including embedding arts education into core subject areas.
• Title III Part A. Can be used to provide supplemental arts-focused resources specifically developed for English learners.
• Title IV Part A. For districts that receive more than $30,000 in Part A funds, can be used to support access to a well-rounded education, which may include arts and music programs.
• Title IV Part B. State education agencies (SEAs) can include arts-education activities in their subgrants to school districts or community-based organizations through the 21^st Century Community Learning Centers programs. 
• Perkins V. Can be used to develop arts-related career and technical education programs of study (e.g., audio/visual technology). 

Additionally, under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), states and districts can use Part B funds to provide special education and related services in arts-focused courses. 

Getting the Most Out of Your Arts Education Dollars

How can district administrators make informed decisions about the most effective use of the resources they are earmarking for arts education programs to ensure they are making the most strategic investments of these often scarce education resources? Applying learnings from the trove of available evidence is a great place to start.

For the past several years, the federal government has been building a body of evidence to support the dissemination, replication, and expansion of effective program models and practices across a wide spectrum of educational programming. To that end, the ED included a requirement in the AEMDD and AAE programs to conduct a rigorous evaluation of grant programming. Learnings from these and other arts education program evaluations and research studies have been collected and are available through numerous sources, including the ED’s What Works Clearinghouse and the Arts Education Data Project and ArtsEdSearch sponsored by the Arts Education Partnership. 

Over the past 20 years, Metis has supported nine grantees in conducting rigorous impact studies across 14 ED-funded arts education projects. These evaluations have informed service delivery and supported a continuous improvement model, and produced credible findings as to whether the programs as designed led to positive student outcomes. If you’d like help assessing what is working in your arts education programs and how you can leverage federal funding to sustain these programs, please reach out.

1. In 2022, the Education Department made one award to the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in the amount of $24 million to support the Kennedy Center’s National Arts Education Program. This continued a steady stream of ED grant funding to the Kennedy Center. ↩︎

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