| Term Paper Title | Public School Music Programs |
| # of Words | 1160 |
| # of Pages (250 words per page double spaced) | 4.64 |
Public School Music Programs
Over the past few years, more than one-half of our nation’s public school music programs have been cut. That’s 33%. It may not sound like a lot right now, but if it keeps happening at the current pace, in another few years the music programs will be cut by one-half, and before we know it there will be no music programs offered in our public schools. Our children will have no place to learn music and to appreciate it. I am of the opinion that something needs to be done to prevent this from happening. This report will attempt to explain why our programs are being cut, and why people should fight harder to prevent this from happening.
The biggest reason given by many schools for cutting their music programs is that they simply don’t have enough money in their budget to support all of the programs the school has, not just music, but sports and clubs as well. The obvious question to this is, then, why do they all choose to cut the music program? Why not some of the sports teams? I went to my former high school band director and asked him his opinion. He said that our school board has been quoted as saying that music is the “most expendable” program they offer. My director, Mr. Pendziwiatr, said that the administration thinks that no one would miss the music program if they get rid of it because the only people who go to music functions, such as concerts and competitions, are the friends and families of the people in the events. Everyone goes to the football games and the field hockey games and all the other sporting events, even if they aren’t friends with or related to anyone on the teams. In fact, a survey he gave out in his
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classes for me said that over 90% of non-music students (people not in band or chorus) said that the only time they ever heard the band play was when they went to the football games. None of them ever went the chorus concert, and a few went to the school play (which is a production of the music department), but only on the second or third night if they heard it was good.
So, where does all of this money go after they cut the music programs? That depends on the school. I went around to a few of the local schools who are trying to decide on whether or not to cut their music programs and asked them where they planned to put the freed up money. A few said they wanted to add an expansion to their schools, a few said it would go to repair the school, and the rest said they would divide it up between the most needing organizations, be it clubs or sports. My own school said if it did successfully cut the music program they would use the money to but new uniforms for the football team, which, coincidentally, had a record of 3-27 over the past three years. They sound like a needing organization, but not needing of uniforms.
This just shows what little value people put on music today. Another reason schools cut this program is because they say there isn’t enough interest in it. They think it is a waste of money, whether they have it in the budget or not, to have a program that no one in interested in. However, that was not a valid excuse for the schools I talked to. For e...Read entire document
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