Krystal Johnson

As the engagement strategist for the Arts Education Partnership, Krystal builds and maintains relationships with AEP’s partners and affiliates, contributes to AEP’s publications and provides support for AEP convenings. Krystal comes to Education Commission of the States with experience in education, legislative tracking and management. Krystal is dedicated to helping kids gain access to learning opportunities that match their learning styles; and she hopes to advance equity through her work in arts education policy.
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All blog posts

What’s New to ArtScan in 2023?
Krystal Johnson
30 March 2023

Spring has officially sprung, bringing warmer weather, fresh blooms and a new round of updates to the ArtScan database! AEP collaborates with the State Education Agency Directors of Arts Education […]

Restorative Justice Healing Through the Arts
Krystal Johnson
18 October 2022
New ArtScan: Update or Upgrade?
Krystal Johnson
01 April 2022

AEP is committed to enhancing ArtScan to continuously meet the needs of our network as they utilize the database for their respective work. We are excited about this year’s update…or […]

Impact Stories to Inform Arts Learning Practices
Krystal Johnson
21 September 2021

AEP is excited to launch the Juvenile Justice Series: Broadcasting Arts Experiences this month. Each blog post in the series will focus on arts learning impact stories from youth in […]

Extra! Extra! ArtScan Captures New Policy Area
Krystal Johnson
05 April 2021

Part of our mission at AEP is to research the latest policies and emerging conversations on arts education to provide a one-stop shop for readers. To that end, following last […]

AEP Policy Briefing Shares Youth-Centered Policy & Strategies
Krystal Johnson
22 February 2021

Last month, Arts Education Partnership hosted an Arts and Juvenile Justice Policy Briefing that gathered policy experts and practitioners from the field to discuss ways to emphasize youth-centered approaches in […]

New to ArtScan? Here’s What You Need to Know
Krystal Johnson
13 April 2020

Did you know that Nevada has arts education instructional requirements for K-12 public schools, youth centers, state facilities and detention centers? Neither did I, until I joined the team at […]

A Look at the Role of the Arts in Juvenile Justice
Krystal Johnson
18 December 2019

On a given day 43,580 youths are held in residential placement facilities ― including any public or private out-of-home youth placement facility. Of the youths in residential placement, 1 in […]

Title: 2280 Pasos Bajo un Cielo Nublado | Artist: Hernán Jourdan | Medium: Film

When I was asked to create a work of art exploring literacy, I wanted to create a dance but I had no dancers or a studio, so I chose to use my own body in the space I had, my yard. Fluent Nature is video of micro-choreography that explores what cannot be expressed with words, how nature has its own language, and how placing the human body in nature changes the story.

Title: What Is Me and What Is Not Me | Artist: Alex Chadwell | Medium: Music

My thinking on arts and literacy centers around the concept of literacies and artmaking as both sense-making and meaning-making processes that organically and inevitably overlap, intersect, and reciprocate. Compositionally, What is me and what is not me is a sound collage of sorts (there is no notation for the piece, and I'd be hard pressed to recreate it accurately) that abstractly and aurally represents the relationships between literacies and artmaking.

Title: A Curious Honeybee | Artist: Gideon Young | Medium: Film

Offering welcome through traditional and digital elements of literacy, A Curious Honeybee provides an experiential learning environment by activating visual, musical, natural, and emotional literacies.

Title: Tercera Llamada | Artist: Karilú Forshee | Medium: Audio

La Carpa Theatre is a project that I am currently directing in the Detroit Latinx community. The project aims to strengthen and uplift youth voices through devised theatre, in the style of the Mexican Carpas. This audio was created in the theatrical environment envisioned for our project. The ways in which literacies are re-defined are at the heart of La Carpa Theatre's mission.

Title: Literaseas | Artist: MJ Robinson | Medium: Graphite and ink on paper with digital edits

Title: A Riddle | Artist: MJ Robinson | Medium: Graphite on paper with digital edits

Title: False Binaries | Artist: MJ Robinson | Medium: Graphite on paper with digital edits