Re: Band Directors - how to get there?


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Posted by Cliff on February 09, 2004 at 19:37:12:

In Reply to: Band Directors - how to get there? posted by Kenneth Sloan on February 08, 2004 at 22:09:40:

You have sure ask alot of good questions. I'm a BD in Cartersville GA. IMHO if your son really decides to be a BD then he should pursue a music ed degree exclusively (at the undergraduate level). One possibility would be to spend a year taking the general science, math, english stuff that every student takes. Also participate in as many ensembles as possible. Talk to directors about there jobs. I think we push young people to make life-altering choices when they don't have all of the info. Many will disagree with this. I am not on of these musical snob types who say "only music is worthy of study so why waste time on anything else." But I know MANY music ed majors who are also engineering/computer science etc. double majors. They end up getting frustrated and just get burned out on school (only my observation). So they quit with 40 hours, 50 hours there, and so on. Many of them have 200 hours, yet no degree to show for it in any disclipline. In attempting to be well-rounded they are not marketable in much of anything. I know you didn't really ask for all of that.

Things I would look for in a school.

1. Actual k-12 classroom experience of the faculty
2. Amount of classroom exposure for your son before the student teaching (observations and such). It would be a shame for your son to go 4-5 years of college only to find he hates teaching in his last semester.

Things I would before deciding to be a band director.

First, take pliers and remove your finger nails... No, just a bad joke. If you love kids and music, band directing is great.

1. Talk to band directors at various stages of their career.
2. Observe/volunteer at band camps.
3. Read some books about music education
4. maybe subscribe to the Instrumentalist

Cliff "50% band director, 50% special education teacher" Higgins


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