Human
That includes arts programs. "Imagination is not a state," said William Blake, "it is the human existence itself."
The purpose of education is to help us fully realize and express our identities, and to enable us to exercise our freedoms wisely. Anything less means we are a society that is neither fully human nor fully free.
It's time to declare our unequivocal support for education that draws on the best of us, in a humane and just way. It's time to reject the cynical values that choose profits over people -- especially the youngest people among us.
It's time to declare that each and every one of our nation's children possesses a rare and precious quality, whether their schools are in the Hamptons or Harlem, Northampton or the Navajo Nation, Arcadia or Appalachia.
It's time to declare that each is, fully and profoundly and beautifully, human.
(You can sign the Declaration here.)
(Courtesy of the Opportunity to Learn Campaign.)
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