The Arts should not be the first group of activities cut after budget cuts

You mention in the beginning of your argument that I started out saying sports should be cut first then at the end changing it to they should not be cut first, just looked at equally. I in fact never stated that sports should be cut, just thought about as much as the Arts, which are rarely even given a second chance. I would like to take a moment and speak from experience myself, as you had. A few years back my school district was planning on going under severe budget cuts due to a miscalculation in money. Not even a day after they mentioned the budget cuts they said all art programs would be taken away. This including the winter musical and marching band, which bring in more money than the winter sports taking place around that time. They also were discussing taking away most music and art classes, not just the after school activities. Now this would affect every student seeing as there are graduation requirements about taking two types of Arts. Thankfully problems were resolved and we got to keep everything in the school, except the music teachers lost all of their budget. Anything they bought came from their own pocket. Yet the sports were never looked at. Not even the teams such as golf or swim team that only had about five members each, if even that. You said the school would have to cater towards the activity which holds more students, therefore the Arts which take on around 500 students per year, as a minimum number, would beat the athletic teams that can barely get 5 members a season. As a former athlete I understand the perks of participating a sport. Like you said; friends, discipline, hard work, which you said but also others such as professionalism and respect can also be taught through the Arts. You mentioned Obesity being a problem in the nation, which playing a sport can help solve by keeping kids active. That is the same reason gym classes are required in every grade. Now you can argue doing more outside of gym is more productive in helping the situation, but, a kid will be active if they want to. If they chose a sport, then yes that helps, but they will do something else to stay active if a sport is not an option for them. As for a school who supplies instruments to students. Some students will own their own and will be responsible for anything that happens to them. If a student borrows one from the school they would be responsible for some repairs, such a strings. The school would take major repairs unless the student did something that could have been prevented. In that case the school and student's guardian would split the money or work something out. If each student who is borrowing does not share with another student, which they rarely do, they can indeed take it home to practice. Once the students graduate their instrument would go to the next incoming students. Even if the cost starts to run up, which is should not if everything is planned out carefully, then they can do a fundraiser for the extra money like sports. They should not have to fundraiser every cent though because their money was taken away without a second second spent on the idea. Now as I closed my last argument, I think every activity should be looked at evenly. If you are going to cut a budget of about $1,000 during a year, split it. Each sports season, so 3, would take $250 each season and distributed among the sports evenly to see who loses what amount. The remaining $250 can then go to the Arts and distributed among them for how much they lose each. My main argument is the Arts should not be the first program cut in case of a shortened budget, but instead of every program and activity looked at and treated evenly and with the same respect.