All children are born equal. Unfortunately, even within Canada, equality stops there. Immediately after birth, children are divided on the basis of gender, race and socio-economic status with these divisions setting the stage for their place within our stratified society. While we, as Canadians, like to pretend that this stratification does not exist, it is still the case that in this country the postal code of one’s parents is one of the strongest predictors of a young person’s future socio-economic status. This is not because the children of working-class parentage have less potential than the children of the wealthiest, but because from the earliest of ages they are presented with radically different opportunities.
Even within a public education system designed to fit an image of Canada as a compassionate meritocracy, there is a significant amount of inequality. A school in a wealthier neighborhood has the school council dollars to raise funds for new science equipment, field trips and extracurricular activities while schools in poorer neighborhoods make do with 40 year-old textbooks. Outside of the school walls, this inequality grows exponentially. While one set of children are shuttled between hockey practice, private violin or piano lessons and dance class, their less well-to-do counterparts mind their siblings while their parents work double shifts or take to the streets looking for something to do (and statistics indicate that this “something to do” usually isn’t positive).
In this environment the importance of music education delivered in schools can not be underestimated. Music, even more than sport, is one of the very last spaces in which children have the opportunity to exist as equals. While school bands can cost more than even the most elaborate of sports programs, a basic music program such as a choir or a dance team can be run at next to no cost aside from the time of teacher and/or community volunteers.
From feel-good news stories about Staten Island’s P.S. 22′s choir program to BBC’s popular television series that bring popular choirmaster Gareth Malone into contact with a range of youth, the global transformational power of music, of something as simple as singing together, can not be denied. Even the unlikeliest groups of youngsters – the most apathetic, alienated and untalented – not only willingly commit to these programs, but together perform pieces of music in places that only months before had existed beyond the realm of possibility.
Music education is not about turning every child into a professional musician. What it is about is showing young people that they are capable of accomplishing something great. It is about giving these children the opportunity to prove all those who had believed them incapable of amounting to anything wrong. Music education shows young people that if they are willing to put the work in, that they can do anything. For children who may not have a supportive home life, a successful performance might be first time they know that someone is proud of them or that anyone believes in them. Music education programs allow young people to prove to their families and their communities that not only are they good at something, but they are also good for something. This leads to a train of self-reinforcing positive stereotypes – “If I am good at singing and didn’t think I could be, maybe I can be good at mathematics too (or reading, or science, or running a business – anything really)”.
What is remarkable about these music programs is the way in which they boost the morale of all participants, not only the stars. However those who excel do receive an extra boost from knowing that they are great at something, exceptional even, a boost that can give them a direction and a focus for their future because, despite the latest sales figures, there are still careers to be made in this industry.
It is unfortunate that it is this last bastion of relative equality that is one of the first things to go when budgets are tightened, despite potentially low costs incurred to run them. There are a number of excuses made for not keeping or trying to build music programs – the inability to afford existing “artist in the classroom programs” (even where those are run as non-profits), teachers already being stretched too thin trying to teach multiplication tables to fourth graders who come to school having not eaten breakfast (or lunch) or the concern that bringing in music would distract children from the fundamentals.
For those of us who are musicians or who centre our lives around music in other ways, we know how flawed these arguments are. We know that music reinforces the fundamentals – reading sheet music requires literacy and numeracy. We understand the power of music to keep us focused and to help us push past all of the negative distractions that threaten to envelop us – fear, insecurity and even hunger. We know that music speaks to something within all of us that we cannot ignore, with payoffs more than worth all of the time and effort put in. We know these things and still we are not up in arms about the lack of support for music education? I can’t help but wonder why we are not doing everything we can to ensure that today’s children are able feel the same sense of pride and self-worth that we receive when playing music, dancing or otherwise putting on a show.
Is it because we expect the government to fix it? Especially for today’s independent musicians who have been bred with the D-I-Y (do-it-yourself) ethic, we should know better than to expect the government to fight any of our battles. If we want to save music education, to a certain extent we have to save it ourselves.
To be continued…
Videos to hold you until the next installment
From the BBC series The Choir with Gareth Malone.
From Gene Simmons’ Rock School.
From P.S. 22′s blog.
