Students Sound Off: Sophomore Jonathan Murray Hinely On Why Music Education Is Essential

"Students Sound Off" is an ongoing student blogger contest aimed at providing students a loud and clear voice in the education debate presented by HuffPost Education and Get Schooled. As the eighth post in the series, S.C. high school sophomore Jonathan Murray Hinely answers the question:

If you were given the chance, how would you help kids at your school graduate?

Music teaches patience, hard work, time. It shows how hard work pays, benefits. It helps one see the country, and it keeps kids off the street.

In many states of the union, school districts are short of cash and are cutting music programs in the schools. But this isn't the answer to the problem, it actually contributes to the problem of our schools. Music students score higher on standardized tests.

I have been in some form of music my whole life and the sense of community grows each time our band goes to a new competition. Fellow band members who need help know other students who have had the same class and students help each other.

For some kids, band is not only a place to take refuge in, it is the only reason they come to school. If you get rid of the music program, you get rid of these at-risk students, who then turn to the streets, dead end jobs and a very bleak future. Most jobs in our country require a high school degree, with even more jobs requiring a college degree.

Music teaches leadership skills. The first chair in a band carries the melody. People always want to be first and kids will practice around the clock to get a prime spot. This is the first step of being a leader, which is hard work. The other leadership quality they learn is directing a large group of people, granted to a select few Drum Majors.

Today's drum majors are tomorrow's leaders.

Another thing that goes hand-in-hand with leadership is pride. Most students have pride in the school sports team. Band students have this, but they are also a pride in their art. With pride in their art they can do whatever they want. Pride can make the difference in one's life.

The lack of music in schools is making many kids' lives bleak, and teenagers' lives are already turbulent enough -- you don't want to send them over the edge.

Instead of cutting what students need most, cut things that students don't need. Music is something that is very influential for students, but having 10 secretaries isn't. Save our music.

Are you a high school student who wants to sound off to the HuffPost community and win a chance to blog with a celebrity, politician or activist? Find out how on our contest page or read other essays by high school students.

This contest is brought to you by Waiting For "Superman".

Comments

[ihatetodance]

07:47 PM on 05/17/2011

How about we start with teaching kids how to hear the beat of music? Hearing the beat is a good social skill, then and now. I can just imagine prehistoric tribes, in conflict and without a common language, coming together in a drum circle, entrained by the music.

Being rhythmically challenged is common. But the problem is not a lack of ability, it's a lack of education. Nobody teaches how to hear the beat. Even after years of obligatory music classes as a kid and many years of ballroom classes as an adult, I was still rhythmically challenged. I eventually learned it on my own, which I write about in a dance blog. Here's a recent post on the subject: http://ihatetodance.com/2011/03/10/warning-ballroom-dance-classes-do-not-teach-how-to-hear-the-beat-of-music/

[cryingliberty]

06:06 AM on 05/20/2011

Early-childhood music education classes used to do this. They don't anymore - they spend more time on note spelling and reading music than they do becoming acquainted with the sounds and feel of music. Some of this is due to shifts in music education itself, but a larger part of it is a push by educational theorists to try and minimize "chaos" in the classroom (in which experimentation with freedom of movement, beat, pulse, and expression can create a scene which looks a lot like anarchy in the classroom).

[TheGodsLoveNubia]

04:11 PM on 05/20/2011

Actually, kids are taught to feel the beat in elementary music classes nowadays. It's the first concept they learn and gets reinforced often throughout the school year.

[Zoica]

11:06 PM on 05/16/2011

Learning the speed of light, or how to graph an equation was forgotten as soon as I graduated from high school. However, music helped me endure learning those mundane things which are useless to me now, and it is still a part of every day of my life.

[loki]

10:25 PM on 05/16/2011

http://www.noob.us/humor/south-park-guitar-hero/

this is a great reason we need more music in the schools. musicians, are becoming extinct to the technologies that remove the skills and knowledge of music.

[loki]

10:17 PM on 05/16/2011

been preaching this for decades. Schools cut music and art, only to increase sports, which only creates egotistical narcissistic bullies who often end up not learning a thing in school cause they are coddled and pandered to cause they are special jocks that the schools glorify. I think non health related sports activities should be cut and monies transfered to boosting music and the arts.

[RatPack78]

10:11 PM on 05/16/2011

I was never into sports but I loved band. Preparing for and performing field shows, parades, concerts, fund raising, etc teaches a great deal about teamwork. You push each other to play and be the best you can.

[TggerJen]

10:47 PM on 05/16/2011

Nice! Fanned before, faved again!! Excellent points!

[Dick Stone]

11:07 PM on 05/16/2011

Growing up and being an athlete I never quite got the music thing, but as a college athlete I was given a roommate that was a member of the University band, to help me in English. Every night while I worked out he thought that I was nuts, he listened to classical music I thought he was weird. Eventually my roommate started working out with me and I developed a love for the great classics. That has been many years ago and we still stay in contact and remain good friends, he continues to work out, and I still am a big fan of the classics.

[BeautifulWorld]

11:38 PM on 05/16/2011

I like your Andalusian. They raise them here in North Texas for Medieval Times.

[TggerJen]

10:31 AM on 05/20/2011

You and your roommate were both very fortunate! The best people who come in to our lives inspire us to step out of our comfort zones and grow!

[gallatin]

09:35 PM on 05/16/2011

The comments posted here by and large are all good. Let us not however, forget that private music lessons while justifiably so are beyond the financial capabilities of a lot of folks. Music education in the public school systems (including universities who are also under the gun) is the only way many students can access this most necessary part of our culture and all of it's previously mentioned benefits.

[rambot02]

09:35 PM on 05/16/2011

“Without music, life would be a mistake." -- Friedrich Nietzsche

[atronetti]

09:17 PM on 05/16/2011

Music is math. It is math at it's most elemental level. To understand music, you must understand math. Math skills, and the brain's analysis of math, are reinforced through music. There is no "one way" to learn. That is why we are falling behind in education, and in the world. We stress only memorization, not analysis, creativity and application of knowledge. The arts are a prime way to use the knowledge and apply it in real life.

[AaronMLong]

09:02 PM on 05/16/2011

Nobody's suggesting that music is a bad thing to study. The question is: In a scholastic environment where math and science grades and testing are bad and getting worse all the time, in an economic climate where every dollar spent on education is fought tooth and nail, maybe letting kids take music lessons on their own time might be the best compromise we can make on education.

[zacory]

09:39 PM on 05/16/2011

That's a great argument except for the fact that in most of the school districts that are cutting the arts are continuing to fund athletics at the same or higher levels than years past. The disparity is staggering when considering the fact that the arts has a direct correlation to academic success and intellectual development where athletics does not. What percent of high school athletes go on to be professional or even collegiate level athletes? How many of those student athletes end up playing in amateur, or pick-up games for the rest of their lives?

Music study, performance, and mastery is something that is significantly easier for a wider variety of students to pick up and retain a passion for their entire lives. You can't play football your whole life, but evidently according to popular practice in this country it deserves funding more than concert bands, symphonies, or choral ensembles.

Your argument hinges on the notion that academics is actually being put first, and that music educaiton, or arts education is causing math and the sciences to suffer... but there are studies that directly correlated students studying music to scoring higher on standardized tests. The same cannot be said for Football. And yet here we are cutting funding for the arts and pushing sports.

[hstdem]

12:32 AM on 05/17/2011

You are so right.

The problem is the argument people use: the football program raises money for the school. However, many of those people fail to realize that the money raised goes back INTO the football program- not the general fund.

Also, no one wants to get rid of the athletics department- we just want to move it down the list of priorities. Academics should always be at the top of the list.

A senior gets a signing party (balloons and cake) to play football at a local community college and is celebrated by the school and is covered by the local news. But a senior who is accepted to the #1 engineering school gets nothing- the principal doesn't even realize what MIT is.

It is a sad commentary on what importance society places on academic achievement. The 10 o'clock news always has a sports segment.

[AaronMLong]

07:09 PM on 05/19/2011

Yeah, that's the problem with democracy, what's popular wins out over what's smart. Churchill said it best: "It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried."

While I agree that favoring athletics when academics are struggling is bad policy, physical fitness is ABSOLUTELY something that will help you through your entire life, it will even make you live longer, something I can't say for certainty about art or music.

But this is all moot. The real root of our educational budget crisis is the fact that virtually all school districts are funded by property taxes, so when property values plummet, so do school budgets. Fix the job market, the housing market will recover. Fix the housing market, and school revenues will recover.

[You]

10:48 PM on 05/16/2011

At some times music education may be more beneficial to the math and science curricula than the actual math and science classes. That's one of the points I get from this article (and living it).

[zzeltar]

08:46 PM on 05/16/2011

Law schools and med schools love to accept Music majors. Their analytical and focusing skills are well developed, and of course they are sensitive to sounds which helps in both disciplines. Music education creates a strong student (no matter what they choose as their main subject of study)- the Greeks and the Romans knew this well. Check out Bennett Reimer http://www.menc.org/news/view/the-significance-of-music-education-bennett-reimer-s-new-book-examines-the-profession-s-past-future/

[HeadlessHessian]

08:22 PM on 05/16/2011

I had always wanted to play classical guitar. After my kids graduated college it was my time to spend. No college bills, no mortgage....no high stake worries....So I started about 5 years ago. never looked back!
It is wonderful and it opens more doors than you think.
Learning music, IMHO, should be like classes in history, english, math, science, mandatory. It is a wonderful way to get people to learn to cooperate and work hard with, and not against, each other.
Not everyone is a vituoso, but everyone can be a musician with a bit of hard work and a good teacher.....then who knows how far it will take you.

[TggerJen]

08:11 PM on 05/16/2011

Music is math - think of the spacing of the notes, the timing of the measures, and length of notes too.

Music is physics - think of the different notes we get from strings of different widths and lengths, the different tones we get from different instruments. Think about the difference between strumming a guitar, striking the strings of the piano with the hammers (via the keys), and forcing air past a reed on a saxophone.

Music is spacial and relative, involves timing and counting and shared experiences.

Music is a language too. There are rules to learn, and people learn to read music so they can communicate (play) with and to others.

[Dick Stone]

08:28 PM on 05/16/2011

Not necessarily related to anything. Can you answer a music related question that i have had, does our President speak in Staccato? I only had a couple of years of music, but that is the measure that I always thought that he spoke. Thank You:

[TggerJen]

08:41 PM on 05/16/2011

Well, staccato means 'detached' or separated by silence, in that the notes are short and separate. So, I guess I'd say our President doesn't usually speak in staccato. It's an appropriate descriptor in that he doesn't usually run his words together, perhaps.
I was thinking I'd use the term: measured. My partner just came in the door and he's a musician, so I asked him. I was surprised when he said: 'measured.' (That may be indicative of how long we've been together as much as anything else.) 
I do think our President does have a nice speaking rhythm. He also speaks carefully, in that he enunciates his words well and that's one reason he's a good public speaker.
I'm afraid I probably haven't answered your question at all, and if so, I apologize. It's an interesting question for sure!

[You]

10:44 PM on 05/16/2011

Music is also athletic as anyone who has played a wind instrument knows.

[TggerJen]

10:51 PM on 05/16/2011

Exactly! My partner plays saxophone (soprano through bary) and you're exactly right! I've also seen some drummers (rock drummers, anyway) who have built up some really nice muscles! And those people who carry around the tubas too!

[tamazul]

07:54 PM on 05/16/2011

It certainly allows you to be more rythmic and timely in your daily activities, which makes life less stressful.

[mpilkanis]

07:50 PM on 05/16/2011

As someone with two degrees in music performance, I relate quite strongly to this article. The study of music history is an excellent way to learn about the history of culture, both in this country and the western European countries that gave this country its musical fundamentals. The lives of the great composers were, of course, intimately connected to the political strains that existed during their day. As a performer, one learns quickly the real meaning of "teamwork" which in music is called "ensemble". The most astute of players know intuitively when to lead and when to follow. To create your own music and participate in the recreation of the great music of our world is a sublime thing. Would that everyone could experience it somehow, it truly does bring one closer to heaven.

[Roseberry]

07:49 PM on 05/16/2011

You will probably outlive whatever 'technology' you are being taught in school today, and outlive the latest medical techniques you may be taught in college, and get too old to do all the football or basketball moves. But things that never change, like math, pure science (astronomy, physics) and music, things are are built on absolutes -- those things can carry you though your whole life. Of those, music is the only one that brings enjoyment on so many levels to you first and also to others. Even Einstein said he'd probably have been a musician, if he weren't a physicist.