Music and Technology; Working Together

Brandeis High School is a Title I school with an entirely minority student population of whom more than 83 per cent qualify for the free breakfast and lunch programs. We struggle with a persistently low attendance and graduation rate, although those sorry statistics are slowly improving. We believe that we are making significant progress by offering exciting and attractive curricula that inspires the students to come to school. The music department of Brandeis consists of three teachers who are dedicated to introducing the students to all the wonderful experiences that music offers. We are offering group lessons in various musical instruments as well as music theory and composition. We have created a computer laboratory in which students work with GarageBand and Sibelius computer programs to create their own compositions. It is our experience that the students attend classes when there are exciting and new opportunities of the sort that technology offers. Currently, the school is struggling with high absenteeism. We have found that the music classes with the instrument instruction, ensemble playing, computer-based composition and other technological devices have been stunningly successful in encouraging students to come to class and participate in the work. We want to build on the successes we achieved last year. The laptop computers and software that we are seeking in this proposal will enable us to reach our entire classes (sometimes numbering 50 students), rather than moving from student to student on the individual computer to critique and assist in the composition work. We find that we can only work with a handful of students at any one time because each student works alone on the computer. We will be able to create music, multimedia presentations, theory and history lessons, all to be shown via LCD projector to the students who will then be able to question it, interact with it and critique it in ensemble. In addition, these computers, in addition to our LCD projectors, will also enable us to present our lessons to the classes en masse, using software and attractive demonstrations that we believe will inspire the students to attend class -- and, especially, participate in the work. This is a sophisticated and exciting opportunity for Brandeis High School which until only a year ago was a SURR school, but is now striving to become a school of excellence with a first-rate music department.