When parents attend open house at the beginning of the school year at Hillside Elementary School, not all of them ask questions about the math curriculum or the language arts program. Instead, they seem more interested in which opera students in the second grade will be seeing, since a trip to a professional opera performance has become a tradition, said Linda Azif, a second-grade teacher here. The parents also fight over which parents will be asked to chaperone the trip. We reflect the community's values.
Arts education is a tradition here.
We think arts are so much a part of life. It's almost like cutting off your hand. Such passion about the arts in Hastings, which is home to many actors, singers, musicians, dancers and writers, goes a long way toward explaining why Hillside not only received a Blue Ribbon school of excellence award from the United States Department of Education last spring but was also one of only two elementary schools in the United States cited for special recognition in arts education. The other is Mills Lawn Elementary School in Yellow Springs, Ohio. Both schools will receive their commendations at a ceremony Oct. 28 in Washington.