Help Save Music & Art in Public Schools

  When I was 10 years old, I had the opportunity to take group violin classes at my public elementary school.  When I switched to private lessons after the first few months, my Newton, Massachusetts public elementary school continued to provide me with an outlet for violin by having a school orchestra.  The year after that, I was able to join the All-Newton Youth Symphony.  My public middle school (they used to call them Jr. High Schools) also had an orchestra, as did Newton High.  I was ALWAYS involved with ANY opportunity to play.

  By the time I was in high school, I was playing violin in the school orchestra and percussion in the school's concert band.  I also had the opportunity to play with GBYSO, The Greater Boston Youth Symphony Orchestra for my junior and senior years of high school.  I performed with them in Boston's Symphony Hall, The Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., as well as a tour of England, Scotland, and Wales. 

  I mention all this because music has been a huge part of my life.  If it had not been for the availability of music education and music activities in my public schools, I couldn't begin to imagine what my life would have been like.

  Due to the over-inflated importance of standardized testing created by the "No Child Left Behind" act, many schools in Florida (where I now live) are dropping their music and art classes to focus ONLY on TESTED AREAS!  This is all due to the fact that the standardized test has become the only way in which children and the schools they attend are assessed.  I'm sure this is the case in many other states as well.

  When you get the opportunity, at the polls and elsewhere, to support keeping music and art in public schools, please do so.  We have lost more than most people realize.

  For more information, check out http:/www.aft.org  There's a flash sing-a-long
about NCLB at http://www.letsgetitright.org/cartoon/