Money Down a Rathole? Or, Justifying a Strong Music Program

Join your state music educator's association. Music Educator's National Conference is a great place to start, and what a wonderful network of advocates! It was this this group that pushed for national recognition and acceptance of the importance of music education. MENC also has a great network of folks who will make calls on the state level. In Missouri, the strong Missouri Music Educators Association has been pushing for recognition and assessment of music standards. Music standards have been included in the new state guidelines, and the process is going on in the planning stages of state-wide assessments of not only music, but other fine arts and physical education in general.

Music teachers need to let other folks know just what they do and how they do it. Here are some good links and sources to help you out:

Parade Magazine had a wonderful article in it a couple of weeks ago about music education and how it helps math and other skills. You can e-mail them for more information.

The American Music Conference is a site provided as a service to music, music educators, and music advocacy. This is chock-full of informative sources and other links.

VH1's Save the Music is an effort to help revive, and in many cases, save music education programs by stating the benefits of music education to children, showing examples of successful music education, and interviewing celebrities about the importance of music in their lives.

To get into some of the nitty-gritty of music education research, check out the Music and Brain Information Database, which includes outlines of documentation into music and its relationship to brain development.

For good, extensive, and interesting reading, recommend The Mozart Effect by Don Campbell, which includes actual documented cases on music and its effect on the brain, learning, and personality itself.

Now, use this stuff, and support your art!

Next week....we're getting close to the end of the school year, and no matter what grade level you teach, I'm willing to bet the natives are getting restless! Time for some survival tactics to help you make it until June!

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