David Behling, Notes from Home

Over the summer, a longstanding component of music education at Southwest Middle School in Albert Lea was eliminated. In order to ease scheduling concerns related to other courses, Marcia Langseth, the principal at SWMS, decided that two musics were too many for students. Starting this fall, students have to pick either band or choir or orchestra (one only) or forgo all other electives in order to stay in two music classes.

This change is unfortunate for two reasons. The first relates to the kids in band and orchestra. Unless their families can afford private lessons, those students have been learning how to play their instruments only since the beginning of sixth grade. Asking them to decide after such a short time does not give them much room for figuring out which is the best fit for them as musicians. Once they get to high school, it’s almost impossible for students to participate in both band and orchestra.

I’ve written before about how much music education — both instrumental and vocal — adds to a student’s life and learning. Others have as well. Research has shown that students learning to play musical instruments do better in math and reading. Test scores have risen for those students, and they have become more engaged with their life at school. Most of the students involved in more than one music class that I’ve met in Albert Lea confirm this research; they do well academically. Making it more difficult for those students to do something they love seems an odd way to reward them for academic success.

This decision about music education is also unfortunate because of the process used to implement it. Back when kids registered for classes last spring, families were not told about a change in electives and scheduling. Students and their parents went ahead, in good faith, picking the best possible course options — including music education.

It was late in July when Langseth started calling parents on the phone to make the choice, presenting them with a dilemma. Without the benefit of any prior explanation or time to discuss what this change would mean for them, and which direction they would take, students’ parents were asked to pick between band or orchestra or choir. After some resistance, some families were able to keep the two musics, but only at the expense of all other elective courses. And that’s where things stand now, just before school begins.

The process used meant that there was little clear information about how this change impacted students’ options for instrumental and vocal music after middle school. Were teachers at the high school involved or even informed? Can students forced to choose only one at SWMS go back to two music classes at Albert Lea High? Is this the beginning of a districtwide curriculum change for music classes? Is it related to the pending move of eighth-graders to Albert Lea High School and sixth-graders to SWMS? Will the students who chose to forgo those other electives — art, industrial tech, family and consumer science — be able to easily add those classes to their schedules at the high school?

Both of the reasons discussed above cause problems for students and the district. But the second reason is more troubling. Any time an administrator creates a dilemma like this for students and their parents, the decision-making process needs to be more transparent. I’ve been told that principals in this district have a lot of autonomy when it comes to decisions. I can see the wisdom in that practice. But I don’t buy that administrative “autonomy” at SWMS means that changes can be made in curriculum and scheduling, and then implemented without families being informed and involved.

Public schools need to be strongly connected to the communities they serve, and they need healthy relationships with parents. Those relationships aren’t going to be healthy if parents feel that they are being told what to do and feel powerless to resist. Implementing decisions the way the change to music education was handled, without transparency, creates suspicion. My writing about it doesn’t create that suspicion or the resentment that often follows; I’m writing about it because it’s already there.

So where do we go from here? Langseth made and implemented her decision. What’s done can’t be undone, I suspect. But any future changes like this one — that involve the lives of students far beyond the classrooms of SWMS — need to be made with the involvement of others, especially parents and teachers.

Albert Lea resident David Rask Behling teaches at Waldorf College in Forest City, Iowa, and lives with his wife and children in Albert Lea. His column appears every other Tuesday.