Why Art?

 

Graduate recruitment at auditors and accountants could fall by as much as 50% by 2020 due to the impact of artificial intelligence, according to a top executive of "Big Four" accountant EY. (Oscar, 2016)

 

Meanwhile, BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager in Wall Street, laid off human stock-pickers and replaced them with robots. Meanwhile, the founder of the world’s largest hedge fund, Ray Dalio, has been investing in AI technology related to trading. By 2025, financial institutions will replace their human force by 10% with computers, resulting 230000 fewer employees. (Lucinda, 2017)

                                                                                                        

Artificial intelligence (AI) is gradually replacing our traditional professionals at the present. How can our children immune from the eliminations by AI and their co-workers, surviving in the ongoing competitive occupational markets? 

​

Creativity is one of the most career-securing skills to our children.  In 2010, I.B.M. conducted interviews with the world's top 1500 C.E.O. Asked about the most crucial skills for handling highly volatile markets and rapidly evolving customer preferences, all the tycoons agreed creativity plays a pivotal role in our future success (IBM, 2010). 

​

Likewise, government and renowned enterprises, for instance American Express, HSBC, Intel and the U.S. Navy, have hired art educators to provide training to their teams. By means of art programs, they aim to foster the teams’ whole-brain creativity, innovation coaching and design thinking (Linda, 1999-2017).

​

Indeed, in numerous medical and psychological researches, art training benefit considerably to our children. This discipline improves spatial reasoning (Rauscher, Shaw, Levine, Wright, Dennis & Newcombe, 1997), strengthens cognitive functions (Angel, 2014), and leads to an increased in academic performance (Catterall, 1998). Even M.I.T., the world’s top one university, celebrates the combination of expertise, knowledge and creativity, no matter what the research fields are. It advocates its science and engineering researchers participating in creative arts (Mary, 1993). Cambridge University, another elite university, also supports this education perspective. It points out arts students are highly demanded by the employers in financial and business sectors, and Steve Jobs agrees his Apple success is the result of his hiring artists and musicians fascinated by technology rather than computer geeks (Cambridge, 2017). Consequently, art education can benefit significantly to our children’s intelligence and future career.

​

In my definition, art-and-craft education is not merely about how to depict the subject's exterior realistically enough. Conversely, it should be about how to properly guide our children more open to new possibilities and think out-of-the-box. They should be encouraged to actualize their inner voices, creativity, ideas and imagination about the surroundings, Others and 'Who am I?' to their works— through their own perception and innocence.

​

Through our Vancouver's art classes, our company sincerely strives to discover every child’s creativity, enabling their uniqueness and potential to develop their own excellence in their future.

​

Program Director

Miss Wong

 

 

References:

​

Angel, D. (2014). Expressive Art Therapies in Geriatric Neurology. Retrieved from  http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/9781118730676.ch26/summary

​

Cambridge Assessment (2017). Celebrating the arts - 5 reasons to study creative subjects. Retrieved from http://www.cambridgeassessment.org.uk/insights/celebrating-the-arts-five-reasons-to-study-creative-subjects/

​

Catterall, J . (1998). Does experience in the arts boost academic achievement? Art Education, 51(3), 6-11.

 

Csikszentmihalyi, M . (1997). Assessing aesthetic education. Grant makers in the Arts, 8(1), 22-26.

 

IBM 2010 Global CEO Study: Creativity Selected as Most Crucial Factor for Future Success (2010). Retrieved from  http://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/31670.wss

 

Linda, N. (1999-2017). Creativity at Work. Retrieved from https://www.creativityatwork.com/about/linda-naiman/

 

Lucinda, S. (2017). Robots Are Replacing Humans At All These Wall Street Firms. Retrieved from 

http://fortune.com/2017/03/30/blackrock-robots-layoffs-artificial-intelligence-ai-hedge-fund/

 

Mary, H. (1993). Vest-Art enhances creativity for all at MIT. Retrieved from   http://news.mit.edu/1993/arts-vest-0210

 

Oscar, W. (2016). AI could destroy hiring in one of the biggest industries for graduates. Retrieved from  http://uk.businessinsider.com/ai-could-reduce-graduate-hiring-at-big-four-accountants-by-50-2016-5