The Coming Tragedy for Instrumental Music Programs in the Saddleback Valley

UPDATE: Somehow the District found the money to continue the instramental music programs at current levels, and no music teachers will be let go.

There is great concern among those of us who have kids in instrumental music programs in the Saddleback Valley School District that those programs may soon cease to exist at the level we've enjoyed for many years. School cuts are threatening to reduce instrumental music in the district to an unsustainable level, robbing young kids of the opportunity to develop skills and enjoy the benefits of a music education. According to the Mission Viejo High School Instrumental Music Booster's Club, this is what we might expect to happen:

After SVUSD’s changes go into effect, you can expect the following:

• The Marching Band that has won the State Championships twice – gone.

• The Color Guard that has represented us at National Championships Finals for the past 8 years – gone.

• The National Champion, World Class Division Percussion Ensemble – gone.

• The Jazz Band that gets invited to the Monterey Jazz Festival every year – gone.

• The Orchestra that was invited to perform at Carnegie Hall last year – gone.

The District’s plan is to eliminate the 7 period day – all students will be restricted to 6 periods. Color Guard, Marching Band, and Drumline are 7th period classes. Jazz Band is 8th period. A 6 period day is devastating for the music program!

We have learned that 3 high school music teachers will be ‘let go’. One of our teachers who will be hit is Doug Meeuwsen.

Mr. Meeuwsen is the director of the Jazz Band program (among others) that took us to Monterey last weekend for the Monterey Jazz Festival.

Back in March I wrote a piece that described what the music program in the district has meant to my family. I decided to update that piece and reprint it here:

What invariably happens is that school districts immediately announce the cancellation of music programs and other arts programs that parents really want, and sometimes I'm convinced they do that on purpose to generate anger among the parents in the hopes that they will contact the governor and complain. What you never hear is a district coming out and saying something like this: "We've looked at the situation and we clearly have too many high-paid administrators using up oxygen in our district headquarters. We need to cut back a couple of people whose salaries could pay for all the music teachers we currently have".

The other thing you'll never hear is "we don't really need to take the football team to Hawaii for next season's opener" (which they will next August). For some reason, athletics seem to be untouchable when budget cuts come around.

No, that will never happen. Instead the music programs get the shaft because administrators have no concept of the value of such programs. The word around here is that only elementary music will be cut out, but there's a trickle-up effect when you do that. If kids don't develop a love for music and a basic knowledge of their instrument in elementary school, when they get to junior high they are less likely to start an instrument, and if they do start one they have a lot of catching up to do. The junior high band director finds himself spending his time teaching the basics of playing rather than developing musicians as he should.

That, in turn, hurts the high school program which gets freshmen with only two years of instrumental music experience instead of the four or five they would have with a good elementary program. The entire district's program suffers when the bottom layer is eliminated.

When we moved into our current home in 1990 we didn't really look that hard at the local schools. Our daughter was only 1 1/2 and our son was yet to be. We didn't realize how lucky we were until later when our kids got into music, first at Del Cerro Elementary, then at La Paz Junior High, and finally at Mission Viejo High School. My daughter is a music major in college today because of the love of music that was instilled in her by her public school teachers, especially Dan Robbins at La Paz and John Hannan and Doug Meeuwsen (who is facing job elimination) at Mission.

My daughter plays flute and piccolo, and my son has played trumpet since 6th grade and picked up the baritone this year (he's a junior). Through the music program the kids have been involved in an award winning marching band (my daughter's band won the state championship in 2003), she traveled to the Calgary Stampede in 2004 and both kids will go again this summer, the boy has played several times at the Monterey Jazz Festival (including a week ago), and my daughter performed with the orchestra at Carnegie Hall last June. In what other school activity do you get those kinds of experiences?

Unlike most sports which have a limited time frame in which a person can actively participate, music is something you can do your whole life. While aging football players are gimping around on their bad knees and forgetting their alphabet, musicians are reaching their prime. My daughter has carried her music into college where she is a music education major and recently spent 10 days touring Italy with her college band. Music has taken her to a lot of great places. I just hope there are still music education programs left in schools by the time she graduates.

The parents in this district have been incredibly supportive of the school music programs. Both the La Paz and Mission Viejo Booster organizations are second to none and we've even voted extra taxes on ourselves to pay for school building construction like the new band room that's being built at Mission (thankfully, the funds for that were approved before the coming round of budget cuts). Although the parents are dedicated, there's only so much they can handle. We can't singlehandedly underwrite the district's music program, and what sense will it make to have a shiny new band room and no music program?

I've said all this to support the fact that school districts are hurting themselves more than they'll ever realize if they cut music programs every time there's a budget tightening. Music programs turn out good kids, highly motivated team players who are driven to excellence. I don't know of another school program that has such consistent benefits to the community.

With my son soon to start his senior year, it would be a terrible shame if the programs he loves so much like marching band and jazz band were to be eliminated.

UPDATE: Here's the list of teachers scheduled for layoffs in the SVUSD. Included in the list is my son's current Jazz Band instructor, his statistics teacher, another teacher he had previously and really liked, and the elementary chorus teacher who used to put on such great chorus programs my kid's elementary school.