Unlocking Student Potential through Music Education

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Last summer, the BSD posted a hypothetical story about a girl named Lilly, whose potential was ‘unlocked’ by teacher collaboration time.  In response, the Beaverton Friends of Music have written a parallel hypothetical story about a girl named *Lily*, who would blossom in myriad ways if the BSD supported music education along only the nationally recommended *minimums*.  As amazing as it may seem, multitudes of research studies have confirmed that music education yields the kinds of benefits described in our story.

Imagine a district full of Lilys who each get such rich and broad benefits, and can then go on to share their knowledge and skills with their communities and meet the challenges of the 21st century world-at-large with a full range of options available, ready for college and career.  In these days in which we are called on to do more with less, retaining and building our music education is a clear, obvious choice for maximum “return on educational investment” for all of Beaverton’s children. Here is Lily’s story.

 

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Unlocking Student Potential through Music Education

 

The Beaverton School District is moving forward, in conversation with the teachers’ association, to plan for a consistent time for certified music teachers to give music education to students in every school. This plan will meet the minimum recommended national standard of 90 minutes per week for elementary students and 3 hours per week for those in middle school and high school instrumental and vocal ensembles. The change will represent an increase of an average of 60 minutes per week over the music time elementary students formerly received, and an average of 30 minutes per week over the music time middle students formerly received.

 

Lily is in third grade. Her family moved to the area several months ago. While she does well in most areas, Lily struggles in math. Her parents were apprehensive about the new school, given Lily’s challenges in math. They met with the principal and learned that schools in Beaverton will now give the students music at least a half hour of music three days a week. Lily’s parents already knew that children who receive comprehensive instruction in music score better on their math and reading tests.  The principal at Lily’s new school shared with the parents some of research data on music education that demonstrate multidimensional individual growth, including a study that found musical training far superior to computer training in dramatically enhancing abstract reasoning skills—those used in math and science—from a young age.*

 

Lily is personally known by the music teacher at her new school, and the music teacher will remember her year after year because she will loop with her students throughout grade school.  The results of the new music education policy are in, and they are impressive. Since Lily’s school adopted the national minimum seat time for music as part of its core curriculum, Lily’s achievement in math has skyrocketed from the single digits to over 80%. Lily feels good about herself. Her parents can clearly see the pride and confidence Lily has developed as a musician, and how it carried over to school in general, especially math.

 

How did this happen? Through the power of music education.  Lily loves music because it is the only time of the day she can forget about her problems and create something special as part of a large team. Music stimulates Lily’s mind in a unique way, allowing her to combine the technical and the aesthetic. When making music, Lily and her fellow students are constantly monitoring what they are hearing, seeing, and doing, while making decisions on adjusting tempo, tone, style, rhythm, phrasing, and feeling. This process trains their brain to become effective at organizing and conducting numerous activities at once. In addition, Lily is learning teamwork and other social skills, as well as experiencing the effort and discipline it takes to create a good product.  Lily leaves music class feeling refreshed, renewed, and prepared to continue learning back in her homeroom.

 

The staff at Lily’s school knows that giving children the maximum amount of instructional time with certified teachers leads to the best outcome for the students. Certified music teachers carefully construct lessons that integrate all subject areas within a musical context.  Another benefit of increasing music education time is that while students are learning important skills in music class, their homeroom teachers can use that time to collaborate and improve instructional strategies for students like Lily who may be struggling in certain areas, or those who need greater challenges.

 

Research finds abundant and consistent confirmation of Lily’s experience: that music education leads to greater general academic achievement, individual student growth, and personal success. Music education helps students do so many things at a higher level, including processing language, developing spatial and multiple other intelligences, organizing information, creative thinking and problem solving.

 

Lily’s story illustrates the dynamic power of music education when it is prioritized as part of the core curriculum. For decades, Beaverton schools have offered music taught by certified specialists, but they have never yet met the national recommended minimums. Students have benefited immensely from this instruction as it stands, yet they will benefit even more widely and deeply when allowed the critical minimum time. Further, regular music class creates time for homeroom teacher collaboration, for teachers to meet in learning teams to know better each student’s strengths and challenges, and to meet their specific learning needs, while strengthening their own teaching practice. Collaboration can thus happen without schools having to resort to complicated late starts or activities with non-certified staff. Working together, music teachers and classroom teachers can educate the whole child in Beaverton schools through ensuring consistent, sufficient music time each week, and year after year.

 

*Shaw, Rauscher, Levine, Wright, Dennis and Newcomb, “Music training causes long-term enhancement of preschool children’s spatial-temporal reasoning,” Neurological Research, Vol. 19, February 1997. Please visit http://www.childrensmusicworkshop.com/advocacy/benefits.html for more information.

Willamette Week: Murmers

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WW Article Clip

“Last week, Gov. John Kitzhaber’s Oregon Education Investment Board met to take testimony on education spending and Kitzhaber’s school reform efforts. But only one person on the 12-member board, Hanna Vaandering of the Oregon Education Association, showed up. The board’s chief of staff, Cathleen Healy, says all board members will eventually see or hear all the testimony. Save Our Schools, a watchdog group, called the poor attendance “disrespectful.” The board plans eight hearings across the state to shape next year’s K-20 budget. The Portland hearing was held—without irony—at Marshall High School, shuttered in 2010 for financial reasons.”

Upcoming meetings

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Upcoming meetings:

BFM Planning Meeting
Tuesday, October 23, 2012 6:30 PM
PCC Willow Creek – Contact us for the room number
Agenda: Plan for 10/29 Board Meeting

School Board Business Meeting
Monday, October 29, 2012 6:30 PM
BSD Administration Center
Public comment at the beginning of the meeting.  Please stay for the entire meeting.


Oregon chief education officer Rudy Crew talks education reform with Washington County parents

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Oregon chief education officer Rudy Crew talks education reform with Washington County parents

Andrea Castillo, The Oregonian

Oregonians need to begin thinking of education like a market economy, said Rudy Crew, Oregon’s chief education officer. Parents and students must speak up about what they want before improvements can be supplied.

 

Crew spoke at a public town hall meeting at Liberty High School in Hillsboro on Wednesday night.

 

He said parents are typically quiet until their children are affected negatively. But they need to begin asking for change, rather than simply showing up to discussion forums.

 

“Speak up and be constructive,” he said. “You are a demand market, not a supply market.”

 

The best way for parents to provide input is to organize in a way that maximizes communication, he said. Parent teacher associations and organizations are examples of such a venue but have been far too passive in the past.

 

Crew said budget cuts shouldn’t result in cutting arts and extracurricular programs. Rather, budgets need to be reworked so that they are getting the absolute most out of their money because cutting creativity leaves adolescents vulnerable to the pressures of a “seductive world.”

 

He said the state’s funding formula needs to be reevaluated.

 

“We fund things on how many bodies walk through the door,” he said, “not how well they did when they walked out.”

 

Crew said Oregon has strong leadership in public education, but needs change in order to close the achievement gap.

 

“It almost sounds like something out of Dickens,” he said. “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.”

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Public Testimony by Jennifer Mohr
School Board Business Meeting
Beaverton School District Administration Building
September 24, 2012

To the School Board:

For over 4 years, district officials have attempted to reduce music programs at certain small elementary schools using the argument that this would create more “equity” of experience for students at schools of various size.  The reasoning was that a school of 300 students “didn’t need as much” music/pe/library as a school with 800 students… yet all had been assigned one full-time music teacher, one full-time pe teacher, and one full-time media specialist.

Since our elementary schools in Beaverton have never actually met the nationally recommended minimum of 90 minutes of music instruction per week, my friends and I have always found it interesting that the district would see fit to balance programs by taking away from music staffing at small schools rather than adding to the large schools.  Be that as it may, this year was billed as the year to create equity … to create a “school district” rather than a “district of schools.”

In your packet, you will find a copy of the draft schedules provided by the district during the budget process this spring.  Tonight, I am here to report that these drafts have become a reality, and they expose an ugly truth: the drastic cuts to our music programs this summer have created even more disparity between the schools.  While children at Bonny Slope see their music teacher for 45 minutes once every 8 days (and have a total of 21 music lessons for the year), children at my own school get music once every 6 days (total 30 lessons), children at Barnes get music once every 4 days (total 40 lessons), and children at Aloha-Huber Park get music twice every five days (total 70 lessons).  This disparity is real at schools throughout the district, depending on school size.

Since children at Aloha Huber now have music for 45 minutes twice a week, they are finally meeting the nationally recommended minimums.  When the district finally does decide to create equity, this should be done by bringing all schools up to the national minimums using a model like the one at Aloha Huber.

Also, please note that our curriculum is now vastly out of balance.  During the 6-day specials rotation that is common at average-sized schools, children now sit behind a computer for their 45-minute “specials” twice as often as they have pe and twice as often as they have music.  Of the 6 days in the rotation, children spend one day in the library, two at computers, one with the counselor, one at music and one at pe.  Yes, the counselor is now used in the specials rotation at my school and at least 16 other elementary schools.  She teaches “guidance lessons” to regular homeroom classes of 30+ students during 45 minute sessions all day and has only 45 minutes per day to actually do counseling.  Last year, as an elementary counselor, she had over 4 hours a day to provide responsive services.  All of these counselors are now down to 45 minutes per day.  The dramatic changes at the elementary level have created unacceptable levels of imbalance and inequity and should be corrected immediately.

Jennifer Mohr
Music Teacher
Cooper Mountain and Fir Grove