Working toward its mission of advancing active participation in music making across the lifespan, The NAMM Foundation has pledged a $10,000 grant to the Anaheim City School District (ACSD). The grant helps to support the district’s budding school music and orchestra programs. Anaheim is home to the NAMM Show, the world's leading trade-only event for the music products industry, held annually at the Anaheim Convention Center.
“The success of the NAMM Show provides the funds for the NAMM Foundation's many efforts to support music education,” said Joe Lamond, president and CEO of NAMM. “And while our members come from around the globe to attend NAMM, we all have a very special connection to the Anaheim community. It is gratifying to be able to assist the children and the inspiring music teachers in the Anaheim City School District.”
The grant presented by Lamond on April 14, will help to offset the cost of implementing comprehensive music instruction into the regular school day. ACSD administers 24 schools, serving nearly 20,000 students in Orange County, CA. ACSD had not offered music education for more than 20 years until the addition of an orchestra program in 2013. NAMM Foundation executive director Mary Luehrsen coordinated a meeting between Nashville’s ‘Music Makes Us’ and ACSD to lend firsthand guidance for music education reinstatement. Together the groups laid out the plans for Anaheim’s fall 2014 music education pilot effort.
According to Dr. Linda Wagner, ACSD’s superintendent, the combined plan of a regular school day music program and a school orchestra will integrate music education into the core curriculum of ACSD schools. “We are gearing up to return music to its rightful place in our public schools,” she said. “We are grateful for this donation, and thank the NAMM Foundation for its support.”
In addition, through a recent partnership with the Orange County Symphony Orchestra, students have the opportunity to learn to play music in an after-school lesson program taught by symphony musicians. When the students have mastered the basic skills of string, woodwind, brass and percussion instruments, ACSD plans to form an orchestra with the participating schools.
