As continuing budget shortages force schools across the city to cut music programs, PS 55 in Queens is about to get a new one. Last spring, LaGuardia High School senior instrumental major David Charles was taking his sister to school at PS 55, when he realized that there was no music program at the school.
He went inside, found the principal, and offered to start one. In his words, "[The principal] warned me that it would require a lot of work and planning, but I told him I was ready for it. We exchanged contact information and I made the first lesson plan and showed it to him. We went over ....[the] cost... the schools budget...who would be interested. Then we handed out letters to the parents explaining what this was going to be about. Parents seemed really interested in the idea....
"Our purpose was to bring diversity to the school and promote musical understanding.... The school found a place (Laconia Music) to buy used instruments for very cheap... I’m going to have to come in before I go to school or after school. I have free periods in the morning and can move some things around."
Wow.
We spend a lot of time complaining about budget cuts and the lack of arts (among a million other things), in our school, but rather than complaining David decided to take the initiative and simply start a program himself.
He says, "Aside from the value of learning music for music's own sake, music has other benefits. Music teaches discipline, and they [students] can apply that to different subjects. It gives them confidence, and something they can show off. A lot of students have different ways of learning, and get depressed and discouraged because they don't learn well in the classroom. Music can be something they feel they're good at and will encourage them. It also gives them an extracurricular activity... keeps them out of trouble and doing something that will enrich their own life as well as others. "
His advice: "If you want music in your school, as parents, you can't ask. You must demand it. Music should be recognized as a subject as well as an art form, because it has the same benefits. If you're good at math, or English, you have a potential profession. Same as music. Talk to the principal, get something together, you have to be proactive. And sometimes you have to do it yourself."
Obviously we can't all march into our kids' - or siblings' -- schools and start music programs. We're not all musicians, to start with. And parents have jobs, students have school. But we can all learn a little from David about taking the initiative to improve our city, one music program at a time.
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