[Dixielandjazz] Music In San Francisco Bay Area Schools

[Steve barbone]

Here is where some money resides for school programs in San Francisco.
Contact Ms. Deborah Bradway, Music in Schools Today, Music Therapist for
more information. She runs programs for the San Francisco Unified School
District. And also runs concerts in Contra Costa County.

Note that she did a fund raiser with Wynton Marsalis and LCJB. You know he
didn't go all the way out there for nothing.    

This may not be your cup of tea, BUT it shows that there is money around for
music. Even in the most impoverished inner city schools, in a "no funds for
the arts" state. A talk with Ms. Bradway might prove enlightening to you Bay
Area musicians.

Or you can use her findings in a music pitch to other Districts. Music, it
seems, does indeed soothe the savage breast. ;-) VBG

Speaking of Marsalis, Jazz At Lincoln Center has a "School Program" that is
national. And they CHARGE for it. "Jazz in a Box" so to speak. 10 CDs, a
lesson plan and related materials to teach Jazz Music & History of Jazz for
ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS. Any teacher/school can get it for just $299. MANY are
buying it. 

Surf around the LCJB web site for info on the tremendous amount of
Educational programs they produce.

IMPROVISE

This is my last post on the great amount of potential out there for OKOM in
schools. (Yeah, I know, Thank Goodness) If OKOM has no audience where you
live and play, it is the musicians' and jazz societies' faults, for
espousing a misguided mission of "preserving" it when the mission should be
"promoting" it. That means THINK BIG and play where the kids are. What could
be simpler? 

Cheers,
Steve Barbone
    
Achieving Through Music is a pilot program of Music in Schools Today, which
provides therapeutic percussion, world music and movement classes to at-risk
youth in Bay Area schools and community centers. The program connects
students to the learning process through caring and skillful intervention.
It includes music classes, one-on-one, dyad or triad intervention, as well
as student performances. Workshops and drum circles featuring students and
music professionals involve parents and community.

We are planting music programs in schools and community centers serving our
most underserved youth, demonstrating how making music can help improve
self-esteem by transforming loss, anger and alienation into personal growth
and inner discipline (rather than violence). Students learn self-expression,
cooperation, altruism and bankable music skills, as well as respect for
teachers and mentors. The long-term goal of the program is to reduce
violence and other at-risk behaviors among youth and to improve academic
performance, school attendance and life skills. Achieving Through Music
includes a web site for young musicians and provides role models, mentoring
and vocational training for youth who have the talent and discipline and
wish to advance in music.

Research conducted of the Achieving Through Music program at James Lick
Middle School in San Francisco has found:

*   The grade average for the intervention group improved from 74.3 to 77.9.
    The grade average for the control group declined from 74.1 to 70.8.

*   The average number of absences in the intervention group was 10.8.
    The average number of absences in the control group was 21.8.

*   All students in the intervention group maintained or improved
    citizenship marks, while the majority of students in the control group
    exhibited a drop in citizenship marks.

For the 2004-2005 school year, our Achieving Through Music program is at:

*    Aim High Academy, San Francisco
*    Bernal Heights Recreation Center, San Francisco
*    Boys and Girls Club, Tenderloin Clubhouse, San Francisco
*    Center for Young Women's Development, San Francisco
*    Full Circle Residential Treatment and Special Education School, Bolinas
*    George Washington Carver Elementary School, San Francisco
*    Glide Memorial Methodist Church, San Francisco
*    James Lick Middle School, GEAR UP program, San Francisco
*    Log Cabin Ranch School, SF Juvenile Probation Department, LaHonda
*    Luther Burbank Middle School, GEAR UP program, San Francisco
*    New College of California, San Francisco
*    Visitacion Valley Elementary School, San Francisco
*    Visitacion Valley Middle School, San Francisco
*    William R. DeAvila Elementary School, San Francisco
*    Youth Treatment and Education Court, San Francisco
*    Youth Guidance Center, SF Juvenile Probation Department

It is also being requested by the San Francisco Unified School District for
all its underachieving STAR schools, and by the YMCA for all its
after-school programs.

The San Francisco Department of Children, Youth and Their Families has--
granted Music in Schools Today a total of $298,000 to date to provide our
Achieving Through Music program to the San Francisco Juvenile Probation
Department's Youth Guidance Center and Log Cabin Ranch School. The Achieving
Through Music program allows music therapists to work with our most at-risk
youth and to document how this positive intervention increases student
performance by several measures.

-----
THE MOVER AND SHAKER BEHIND THIS PROGRAM IS:
Deborah Bradway, Music in Schools Today Music Therapist

Deborah Bradway was raised with a family string quartet. She began touring
internationally with the Philadelphia Youth Orchestra at age 14, and by 18
was a professional musician, playing in shows, operas, symphony orchestras,
and quartets both locally and around the world. Ms. Bradway graduated from
the University of the Arts in Philadelphia with a double degree in Viola
Performance and Music Education, and became a certified music teacher and
taught strings in public and private schools. She taught string
instrumentalists at Ithaca College while pursuing a Masters in Music
Education with a minor in Jazz Improvisation. Ms. Bradway is a Board
Certified Music Therapist with a Masters in Music Therapy from New York
University.

Ms. Bradway has worked at Bronx Psychiatric Hospital in Bronx, New York and
Parkside School for Communications in New York City. In addition, Ms.
Bradway was the Teen Crisis Intervention Specialist within the department of
Music Therapy at Beth Israel Medical Center in New York City, working with
HIV+ children, attempted youth suicides, asthmatics in crisis, and
emotionally disturbed youth admitted for self-injurious behaviors or
psychiatric disorders.

Ms. Bradway started a non-profit organization for music therapy with two
other partners based in San Francisco that served the community through free
public music therapy events with capacity ranging from 300 to 1000 children,
adolescents and families, at large venues (i.e. Earth Day, an event with
thousands of attendees held at the Concord Pavilion). Remo, Inc. sponsored
the organization, Absolute Vibration, assisting with free shipments and
recovery of rental drums and percussion instruments to the events. In 1998
she began raising funds through benefit event production with celebrity
musicians. The first event funded a year of music therapy services for a
children's homeless shelter and was accomplished with Wynton Marsalis and
the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra at the Masonic Auditorium.

Currently, Ms. Bradway runs programs for the San Francisco Unified School
District as "Gear Up" Coordinator, and works in a partnership with Music in
Schools Today, providing curriculum improvement, teacher training workshops
on therapeutic intervention, therapeutic music groups for minority at-risk
youth (70% special needs), training and assistance of peer and professional
music-mentors, as well as free community drum circles and concerts. She
consistently holds benefit events, securing funds for schools without
budgets for instruments or music programs.

http://www.mustcreate.org/