Why “Media Arts” Standards Now?

      Media Arts is all around us. We live in a world of multimedia. You are reading this through a media arts form - a graphically designed, globally available website with interactive, multimedia capacity. This has become such a common process that we don’t even think about it anymore. This has been a technological revolution which has quickly become the primary communication mode of our globalizing culture. Yet, this medium is still relatively underrepresented in classrooms, both in viewing and producing by students. This is mainly because technology has been underfunded, actually due in large part to the extreme budget crises we’re just beginning to come out of. Teachers have generally been anxious to receive and integrate technology, but with computers a rare commodity, it makes little sense to emphasize it.

      With budgets increasing again, and new portable devices gaining power and affordability, we are certain to be turning the corner in technology deployment. Media arts, both as a vehicle of delivering curriculum and for active production by students, is due to increase dramatically. Common core standards are designed to be assessed through technology, and have technology and media references specifically embedded within them. Are we prepared for this transition?

       Media Arts Standards and Model Assessments will assist in a coherent, sound transition into the 21st Century. Media arts is framed as an integrative arts and design discipline. To describe it more specifically, it is nebulous and connective, with synthesizing capacities. The term ‘media’ itself describes the connecting process or force between things. So, media arts has many different types of interface, and many ways of conveying information and expression. Media arts can serve as a nexus point between different contents and physical processes.

       This is a significant benefit because traditional education is challenged by its regimented, siloed categories in subject areas and learning processes. It is difficult to create interdisciplinary learning that crosses those borders. Each core content has competing priorities and mandates. Each teacher is pressed for time to cover his or her material in preparation for testing. Getting together to make those connections is a lot of extra work and is not inherently supported by the institutional infrastructure.

       Media arts can provide a vehicle for overcoming these barriers so that disparate vocabulary, concepts and processes are connected coherently and made more meaningful for students. If you look around at the world around us, which is very multimedia rich, this is how we live and learn in everyday life.