By Cameron Ibrahim
Staff Writer
Because Mira Costa is a school that fosters students who have a mentality geared toward academic rigor, art credits provide a welcome break in a student’s schedule. Art classes provide a respite in a student’s day and fulfill the UC art credit; therefore, they should be required for Costa students to graduate.
Schools in the UC system require at least one year of an art as part of their admission requirements. According to Naviance, over 100 Costa students are applying to UC Berkeley, Los Angeles, Santa Barbara and San Diego. Considering how many students apply to UC schools, an art course is a natural and necessary requirement to prepare students for college admissions.
In addition, according to a paper published in the Journal of Life and Biosciences, written by Kamali Jadar and Javdan Moos, art has the capacity to raise self esteem and promote health. There are several studies involving art therapy that demonstrate increased happiness in those who create art. Therefore, by taking an art class, not only do students get a less intensive non-core class, but also a positive psychological effect.
Costa offers 48 art classes that range from woodshop to photography, with 36 fulfilling the UC art requirement. Since art is an individual’s mean of expression, this variety of options allows students to take a course within their personal interest.
The current offering of classes at Costa is exceptional compared to the 19 art classes offered at El Segundo High School and 20 courses offered at Redondo Union High School. The classes at Costa include several advanced art classes such as AP Studio Art and Advanced Ceramics. Because Costa already offers a wide variety, it is unnecessary that they try to accredit additional courses. Offering too many courses comes with the risk of creating a class that does not have enough students to function properly. For this reason, it is good that the application process for UC accreditation is complex and comprehensive.
Improving the courses that have already proven successful is a much better use of teacher and administrator time than going through the long process of getting a new course accredited.
Though a required art credit is useful when applying to a school in the UC system, which shares the art credit requirement, students applying to colleges that do not expect an that requirement, sometimes question the validity of this Costa requirement.
However, an art class remains an excellent stress reliever and a potential break for some students, whether or not they are aware of the benefits. As such, it should still be a requirement to stop students from completely filling their schedules with academic courses and accumulating an overwhelming workload.
For students who want an additional academic course, however, Costa offers courses such as AP Art History. Students who take this course can simultaneously get an art credit and add another academic course to their schedule. Costa offers a good mixture of academic and traditional art courses, like drawing and ceramics, to satisfy all student interests.
Art classes are a break from stressful academic classes and serve to fulfill one of the UC admission requirements; an art requirement ensures that there is a non-core academic period in the student’s day, and Costa’s current art credit offerings are adequate without becoming a series of empty courses.
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