Many Alabama children are artists, but not every school has a teacher available to work with those interests.

This week, to celebrate the National Arts in Education Week, Alabama’s Artistic Literary Consortium is visiting three elementary schools to introduce the arts in educational and exciting ways.

The ALC aims to prepare current and future educational leaders on the importance of arts education and how it can benefit their schools through professional development. Resources are provided to school districts through collaborative sites in Birmingham, Huntsville and Tuscaloosa. A fourth site in Mobile is in the works and is expected to be operable by next year.

“Each collaborative site focuses on the local needs of their schools and communities. They identify needs from their on-the-ground work that the ALC can then support and advocate for at the state level,” said Ashley Lucier, the state director of ALC. “In addition, we partner with

Three people are dead, including a 19-year-old gunman, after a shooting at a St. Louis high school Monday morning that also sent multiple people to hospitals, police said.

Chaos unfolded shortly after 9 a.m. when authorities learned of a shooter with a long gun inside Central Visual and Performing Arts High School. The school and the Collegiate School of Medicine and Bioscience, which is in the same building, were locked down.

After a gunfight with authorities, the suspected shooter was taken into custody and later pronounced dead, an official with the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department told reporters.

He was identified as a recent graduate from Central with no prior criminal history, Police Commissioner Lt. Col. Mike Sack told reporters at an evening news conference.

Sack said the alleged gunman entered the school with a rifle in an “aggressive, violent manner.”

“There was no mystery about what was going to

by Regina Marie

Why does art matter? It’s a question that has given philosophers and artists food for thought for centuries. 

It’s also been a leading question in many schools.

At a time when budget cuts are forcing school administrators to put various curricula on the chopping block, it’s been an important question. Too often, arts programs are the first to be cut.

From their earliest years, many children communicate and learn through artistic expression. Songs help them learn words and repetition to develop speech and reading skills. Drawing, painting and doing crafts help to solidify their motor skills. And surveys show that 88 percent of Americans consider the arts part of a well-rounded education.

Still, a recent American for the Arts public opinion survey found that the percentage of students receiving arts education has shrunk dramatically over the last few decades.

And it turns out that investing in art