As I have thought about how to advocate for music, there is a theme that keeps coming up. Do I stand up for music because it helps students' standardized test scores? Or, do I argue that music for musics' sake is enough for people to understand? 


The obvious answer is a hybrid of the two questions, but nevertheless, I would like to lay down a framework of ideas that have come up.


#1:  When we make connections between music and student achievement in other disciplines, we need to explore WHY this achievement has climbed. Music gives students a new way to see math. The dimension of time relationships in music is a way that students can feel math. They can sense proportions of 2 to 1, 2 to 3, etc... when they perform the differences between quarter notes, half notes, and triplet figures. This is a way to experience mathematical ideas in a different way. Students who may never have understood fractions can still perform notes of different lengths. When a student can begin to understand how their performance relates to what is printed on a page of music, that student can make connections between performance and mathematics.


#2: Students "Read" music in a way that creates connections with English test scores. In traditional reading, students can stumble over words and spend a lot of time fumbling around for understanding with what they read. In music reading, students must read in a given tempo, which forces them to read at a faster rate. Since musical line can be left up for interpretation, a student learns to make inferences about possible meanings of notes on a page. This kind of creative thinking adds depth to that student's understanding of classroom texts in reading and other reading-based disciplines.


#3: Students who participate in a music ensemble have a chance to be part of a group in which NO SINGLE person is un-important. If one musician does not play a solo, or if one player holds onto a note for too long, an entire performance can be jeopardized. This is a unique situation that does not happen in a normal classroom or any sport (except for individual sports). This kind of accountability teaches students much more about life than many experiences in their adolescent years. 


While I do not claim to be an expert in cognitive research and music, I do think that, as musicians, we must find ways to speak up for ourselves as important independent from our affect on test scores. This is a short list of items I believe are crucial to advocating for the arts and music specifically. I hope to add more as time goes on and I hope to edit these as I learn new things about music and education.


-Andrew Beard