Governor's School for the Arts

Sophomores and juniors who may be interested in applying to the Governor’s School of Excellence in the Arts, Summer 2009, should get the audition materials off the website below.

http://www.pgse.org/content/blogcategory/14/36/

  The deadline for turning in visual arts, dance (ballet, modern or jazz), music (vocal and instrumental), theater and creative writing portfolios will be Monday, December 22^nd.

  An information session will be held on Monday, October 6^th at 2:45 in the Ceramics Studio for all the arts.   

 

---

 

Music educators battle cuts in class time, lobby for support.

On the front page of its Metro section, the Washington Post (12/17, B1, Strauss) reports, "Despite research showing that students who study music have better attendance, achievement, and lifetime earnings, music classes are struggling to survive." Many "place some of the blame on the federal No Child Left Behind law." According to a report released this year by the nonprofit Center on Education Policy, the amount of time schools spent "on arts and music in 2007 is about half what it was before No Child Left Behind became law in 2002." As Congress debates revisions to the law, some educators are "lobbying legislators to raise the profile of music education,...pushing for more money for arts programs and seeking a requirement that school systems report to the federal government on the status of their music education programs." The Post profiles Virginia 's Metz Middle School , which has begun a popular elective class in acoustic guitar, but has been forced to cut music classes so that "students no longer have music class every day."

        In an accompanying story, the Washington Post (12/17, B2, Strauss) reports that according to a Harris Interactive poll of high school principals, schools with music programs have higher attendance rates and higher graduation rates. The same poll found that "86 percent of college graduates had some music education when they were in school, compared with 65 percent for those who had not completed or completed only high school." In addition, "eighty-three percent of people earning $150,000 or more had a music education, the poll found."

 

11:26:  Check out this article below:

Poll suggests that music students more likely to become high-earners, fulfilled adults.

Iowa's NBC affiliate KWWL-TV (11/13) reports, "A new poll shows that a large number of successful people, from noted scientists to presidents of the United States studied music as children and that may have given them a subtle edge that helped them later in life." According to John Mahlmann, executive director of the National Association for Music Education (NAME), a poll released this week by Harris Interactive revealed that, of "[i]ndividuals who make more than $150,000 a year, more than 80 percent of them had music as an important part of their background." An earlier poll had found that "music students also have higher attendance and graduation rates and higher SAT scores."

        Among other findings of the Harris poll, Bloomberg (11/12, Preciphs), revealed that "seven in 10 adults in the U.S. think music education has had at least 'some influence' on their level of personal fulfillment," and that "people with post-graduate degrees were more inclined to say participation in activities such as glee clubs, orchestras or wind ensembles was 'extremely or very important' to personal fulfillment than were people with less formal schooling." The NAME, which did not commission the poll, held a news conference to discuss the findings alongside musician Steven Van Zandt of Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band, who is developing a curriculum on the cultural influence of rock and roll music reported in yesterday's briefing ( USA Today , 11/12, Marlkein).