NEW: Parts 1 AND 2 -Post-Pandemic Planning Guide: Minimizing Risk, Community Involvement, and Recruiting

Created and developed by the MusicEdNow Team, a panel of top professionals all across our industry –

PART ONE

Welcome to your Post-pandemic Planning Guide to bring back music to your school. Your program may have taken a toll this past year, but we’ve got your back and are going to walk beside you, step-by-step, in bringing back the music!

What should you expect?

Throughout the spring semester, you should expect to receive relevant content to help you prepare for the upcoming school year. This might include talking points for an impactful conversation with your principal, recruiting and retention ideas, and creative tools to ensure that music remains a cornerstone in your school in life after COVID-19.

So, let’s get started!

GOAL: LAY THE GROUNDWORK

This month is all about laying the groundwork. Our goal is to uncover any roadblocks that might present themselves later in the spring and to ensure that music has a voice at the table as plans are made for 2021-22. Have you considered these items to prepare for the fall?

• Touch base with your building administrator or principal to determine your teaching schedule for the coming school year as well as what needs to happen to have a successful recruiting season. Here is an email template to kick off that conversation and checklist of items to consider to ensure you are prepared for this conversation.

• You may need to remind your administrator why music is a crucial part of the curriculum. Here is an example of a presentation successfully used by teachers in Lincoln, NE to ensure continued support of music programs.

RECRUITING TIP: PREP NOW

We all know recruiting is 24/7, but it is more important than ever to be focused, organized and proactive. We’ll provide a recruiting tip or action item in every email to help and inspire you. Our tip this month is:

• Start collecting written and virtual testimonials from your parents and students about the importance of music in their lives. These can be outstanding materials to help you recruit later in the semester. Here is a sample email/letter you can use to collect these testimonials.

RESOURCE ROUND-UP

If you are looking for some more resources to help you with these conversations and to-do items, here are a few you might consider:

• NAMM’s Webinar on “Talking to your Administrators about why Music Education Matters” (recorded Oct. 8th, 2020)
• Amro Music’s Podcast on Recruiting Resources from Yamaha Featuring Disney Pixar’s Soul (recorded Jan. 5th, 2021)
• NFHS summary of most recent aerosol study results

PREVIEW: THE TRAINING PLAN

Like anything you hope to strengthen, your recruiting program can benefit from regular “workouts.” We’ve built a 16-week training plan to guide you through the rest of the school year: breaking it down into manageable to-dos and helping you finish strong, with a full program for Fall 2021.

In Part 2, we’re focused on setting the table for credible, impactful conversations with your building principal, school board members, and elementary school teachers. It’s important that we proactively share information with key decision makers to ensure our program’s voice is heard throughout the spring and the entire decision-making process.

LET’S TALK MINIMIZING RISK IN MUSIC

There is still a great deal of concern relating to the spread of COVID-19 in our schools, so it’s important that we are prepared to address this head on. Fortunately, there are significant studies underway that directly address how to minimize risk in the music classroom. Here are the key takeaways from the most recent findings in a long and abbreviated format.

• It’s important we use the appropriate vocabulary when communicating these findings. These measures do not make music “safe”, but rather, “significantly reduce risk,” in some cases by up to 90%. We want to ensure that we are communicating this information accurately.

We also want to communicate this information to our key decision makers in an easy-to-follow format, so that they can make the best decision possible. Don’t assume they know what you know! Here is an email template you can use to communicate this important information about safety measures to your decision makers.

GOAL: GET YOUR COMMUNITY INVOLVED

It’s vitally important that our community supports the arts, and who better to lead this charge than music teachers? The National Association of Music Merchants (NAMM) recently launched an initiative called “ARTS ARE EDUCATION”. You can find the press release for this initiative here. This is an easy, turn-key way to share the importance of music with your community and gather support.

Get your community involved:

• Take the ARTS ARE EDUCATION Pledge. Click here to do so.
• Ask parents to take the ARTS ARE EDUCATION pledge.
• Involve your building administration and build support for the arts by making them aware of this initiative. Here is an email template you can use to open the conversation.
• Request time (or enlist a few passionate band parents!) to speak to your school board about the importance of music education and ask them to support the ARTS ARE EDUCATION initiative by signing the pledge.

RECRUITING TIP: IT’S ELEMENTARY
Recruiting can never start too early, and elementary school music teachers are a great ally in this activity. Here are some things to do now to kick-off recruiting alongside your elementary school teacher:

• Begin collecting student testimonials to share later with prospective students at the elementary school. Current students can use Flipgrid or another recording software to record a few lines about why they joined band, orchestra or choir. Here’s an example.
• Arrange with the teachers of the elementary programs to meet with their classes via Google Meet or other platform to provide an engaging session on “exciting music opportunities at the middle school.” This would be a great time to share videos of current high school or middle school students having fun making music! For now, just get a date set. We will send some content ideas in our next blast, but here’s a sneak peek of some great ideas if you’d like to get started.