Our First Photo Shoot
@artsparents is our twitter handle that we stopped monitoring
Thanks to our fabulous photographer Henry Huey in Round Rock, TX
Our Story
Knowing there were hundreds of parents like us in our community that have watched their children flourish due to participation in these programs (not to mention the latest research that is proving how these programs improve test scores, graduation rates, social and emotional learning and build the human skills computers can never replace) several Central Texas parents, teachers and administrators decided now was the time to act.
Parents for arts education was created in 2021 as a nonprofit organization in Texas to unite parents, students and educators to encourage, support and advocate for the future of fine arts education in our schools and communities. We spent the next three years listening and evolving with the changing education landscape while ensuring that our voices were heard at legislative events. After working alongside Teacher organizations and the Texas Arts Education Campaign, it became clear that the parents need a separate, organized voice in addition to teachers and administrators in the overall fight for fine arts education policies and funding. However there’s so much more we can do year round to reach younger parents and educate them on the importance of enrolling their children in these classes…. ensuring there is always a demand for these programs while teacher and other arts organizations work on the supply of quality teachers and courses.
In 2023, we built some strong collaborations and looked to develop a structure on how to reach these parents. One example is a collaboration with Texas PTA and the Texas Cultural Trust. Our founder, Trina Martin, worked closely with both organizations to create a “Connect” meeting called Arts in Education that became available to all PTAs across Texas in 2024. By the end of the year, we became an official 501c3 and began looking toward funding opportunities to build a sustainable structure to recruit and educate volunteers to coordinate events and bring awareness in their own communities.
In 2025, we joined other arts education advocates on a national and statewide level to bring awareness to the importance of fine arts education and the need to fund these programs. Additionally, we added “Students for Arts Education” to give current and alumni students volunteer and leadership opportunities around advocating for the programs they love.
Future:
As we look toward the the 2025-2026 school year, we are promoting the use of our parent advocacy toolkit and materials to launch pilot programs at a grassroots level. Additionally, we plan to start regional SAE chapters with high school and university students. Our goal is to create a sustainable framework to reach, educate, and mobilize parents and students, including alumni, with current and accurate information they can apply to their local needs. By using the same tools and messaging we can build a stronger coalition and change the narrative of fine arts education being “nice to have” to essential for future workforce readiness. This will ensure that while we advocate for policies and funding to support fine arts education at the state and national level, future parents will maintain high demand for these courses due to increased awareness of their benefits to true college, career and military readiness by enrolling their children in these programs despite the many other available options.
Our founder, Trina Martin, has purposefully looked for opportunities to get outside of the arts "bubble" and stop "preaching to the choir, after they joined choir". She was invited to be a part of a TEDx conference in Round Rock, TX in November where she will deliver a TEDx talk titled "AI can't replace this: Why arts education matters". Look for this to be posted on YouTube and our social media platforms soon. This will be a great tool for all to use to spread the message about the importance of fine arts education.