Why won't Tennessee let me be a Classroom Music Teacher?

I applied for the Teach Tennessee program and was turned down. What the massive bureaucracy of the Dept. of Education fails to see is that licensure merely means persons have successfully jumped through a series of hoops. It no more guarantees that a teacher knows how to teach, has a gift to teach, likes to teach, or even wants to teach than an M.D. guarantees a doctor will compassionately care for his patients.

My life experience is worth more than 12 credit hours of teacher education and one year of internship. I work for an enzymologist in the Vanderbilt University Medical Center. Recently the American Chemical Society appointed my boss Editor-in-Chief for the science journal Biochemistry. He assigned me to train a new hire to be the office supervisor. I had to familiarize her with all aspects of my job as an editorial assistant, from manuscript receipt through each step of the peer review process to final disposition (acceptance/rejection). I sat with her for several weeks at the computer and took her through all the motions of utilizing the multiple databases involved while she took notes and asked questions. For every new concept, I made sure she got hands on experience at the computer, repeating the task until she felt confident. In turn, when another editorial assistant was added to the staff, she was able to teach him.

At a previous post, for the Journal of Non-Crystalline Solids, housed in the Vanderbilt School of Engineering, I worked alongside a young black woman with a degree in psychology from MTSU. I was the editorial assistant and she was the journal secretary. We came from very different social, educational, cultural and ethnic backgrounds. Her pattern of learning was to carry on the patterns handed down to her by predecessors. Mine was to find new and better ways to accomplish the task at hand. On this point we clashed mildly, although we learned to respect and accept each other's differences in order to work together. We remain friends to this day.

As a piano teacher at Belmont Academy, many diverse types of learners enter my studio. One unique young man who came to me recently has Asperger's Syndrome, a mild form of autism. He graduated high school with honors, but is not pursuing college at present. His mother, a therapist, screened me before bringing Casey for lessons, since he had been kicked out of various classes for behavioral reasons, including a negative encounter with a music teacher. I assured her I had the patience to handle him, being myself the father of a mentally retarded adult. Casey and I hit it off right away, and it was not hard to find what he responded to. I tailored our lessons to fit his taste in music and his uncanny ability to learn by imitation. I've learned to sense when he tires of the academic approach using a text method, and at that point switch gears to focus on playing by ear, or exchanging stories (he is a wealth of trivia), or taking a look at a downloaded video game theme. He is continuing with me into the summer session, and I expect will do so beyond that.

During an 8-year position as a choir director for an Anglican congregation in Franklin, I held weekly rehearsals with an adult choir that included high schoolers. It was my duty to teach them a large volume of hymns, anthems and responsorial chants every week in accordance with the lectionary in the orthodox tradition. About two dozen persons of widely disparate ability were under my charge. Hymns and chants were reinforced on a weekly basis for each Sunday. Anthems, however, required about six weeks of preparation from introduction to performance. I devised a teaching plan for mid-week rehearsals and taught each piece in a sequential manner, incorporating more refined elements each week until the product was polished. The greatest advance I made with this group in the areas of critical thinking, problem solving and performance skills, was to teach them to read music. Prior to my arrival, they depended on a leader who conducted everything — beats, entrances, dynamics, phrasing, cut offs, and so on. As a choirmaster-organist, my hands were occupied, so I taught them to read by demonstration, verbal instruction, notation on a dry-erase board, and even a Sunday School class on "How to Read Music" offered to the entire parish using a Cokesbury teacher's guide and student worksheets. The result was that they no longer needed to be spoon-fed by a conductor, but could interpret the printed score themselves while I gave minimal leadership from the organ.

In the choral leadership position discussed above, I treated weekly choir practice like a school classroom. "Students" were expected to arrive promptly at 7:00. I had a consistent lesson plan which allowed for a 10 minute snack break at 8:00, and then we would continue until dismissal around 8:45. By creating a friendly, casual environment, members were encouraged to interact socially. Although I taught intensively, I used humor and positive-reinforcement to enhance the learning atmosphere. To make the most of our facilities, I organized the choral library, revamped the shelving system so each member had a place for his or her folder and supplies, purchased new seating, new storage units, new risers and other equipment. I also bought and utilized management software related to downloading music materials and fulfilling copyright obligations. I regularly kept choristers abreast of plans and dates via email or phone, and even maintained a website as a reference source for those who might have to miss a rehearsal.

As a teaching assistant for three professors at the Blair School of Music, I was often called upon to substitute lecture. One day I was slated to speak on the operas of Richard Wagner before a class of 50 Vanderbilt students. I wanted them to get a sense of how the composer was "larger than life," so before the class arrived, I set up an altar to Wagner using an LP jacket and candles. I darkened the lecture hall and played a CD as the students entered. This was to set a dramatic stage for reading a commentary by one of Wagner's contemporaries exposing how eccentric he was. I felt using this approach made a more colorful impression than simply saying, "Turn to page 254 in your text and we'll discuss Tannhauser."

Another example is from my Navy journalism days. At the Defense Information School, we produced various educational audio-video materials. One production I was cited for was a taped video short where I taught the audience how to read music. Starting from scratch, I had them singing from the blackboard in about 10 minutes. A multi-media documentary presentation which I wrote, produced and directed from a closed-circuit television studio control room involved stills (photos and slides) and live action with two narrators on the subject of the "Holy Shroud of Turin."

As an editorial assistant for the Journal of the American Chemical Society, I had oversight for helping authors properly format their papers to meet the printer's specifications. This led to the development of a detailed guidesheet distributed to all authors whose papers had passed the peer review process to the point of being considered for publication. Quite understandably, many authors do not place as much weight on grammar, required content, size of figures, order of elements, font size, spacing, etc. as on the chemistry. Often the papers are written by persons from foreign countries or working in a university lab setting whose first langauge is not English. It has been part of my job to help them conform to very specific criteria so their research can be published. In this regard, I communicate with authors, mostly via email, concerning these requirements and how to meet them. I refer them to information located on the websites of the American Chemical Society, attach various forms (such as Copyright Transfers), and make every effort to teach them what to do to expedite getting their research in print.

Vanderbilt Human Resource Services provides an annual performance evaluation form for supervisors to use. It has room for general comments, a table listing key functions pertaining to the employee's specific classification (rated from 1-5), a section on adherence to the Vanderbilt "Credo," which has to do with customer focus, problem-solving, accountability, service excellence, respect for others and improvement (also rated from 1-5). As with any HR form, there are strengths and weaknesses, and the evaluation is only as accurate, fair and valid as the evaluator. In my case, my boss—who heads his own chemistry lab in the medical center—is a very remote supervisor who knows very little of my day in/day out activities. Due to focusing on research, he pays little attention to personnel matters, and has for 7 years allowed me to be relatively autonomous. While on one hand this is a positive thing evidencing a degree of trust, it also has resulted in a non-growth relationship where he knows nothing about me as a person. It has also led, at times, to what I believe are incorrect assessments of my performance. For example, I was recently criticized for coming in to work late. It turned out he forgot he had approved my working half-days that week! No test or tool can overcome inadequacies of the user. The best assessment strategy, in my opinion, is one based on personal interaction with the subject(s) where open, honest dialogue is the model.

After earning my B.Mus. in '85, I was unable to secure a church music leadership post due to intense competition. So while spending 5 years in public radio, I returned to school and earned a master's in education in 1991. At that point, I was more competitive in the market and had several offers, one of which I accepted. Sadly, it turned out to be a mismatch. Eventually I compromised by pursuing church music as a part-time avocation only, which met with more success. My biggest mistake was to not seek teacher licensure when I was in school, but I had no way to know church work would be so problematic. In the meantime, as a part-time church musician, wedding organist and piano teacher, I have continued to improve myself via membership in professional organizations like the American Guild of Organists, Tennessee State Music Teachers Association, and the National Network of Lay Professionals (Episcopal). The AGO publishes a monthly professional journal and the local chapter holds monthly meetings featuring leaders in the field. I have also attended a summer workshop for music leaders in Colorado called the Evergreen Conference. I am a subscriber to FJH e-Notes, an electronic newsletter from FJH Music Co., publishers of the method I use in my studio at Belmont. In the university setting where I teach, interaction with other instructors helps keep me abreast of techniques. There are also seminars and workshops offered frequently. A few years back I entered the doctoral program in education at TSU but was unable to continue after one term due to family and work constraints.

I had a student from a disadvantaged family who applied for assistance through a school porgram. The administrator of the scholarship was The Community Foundation of Middle Tennessee (www.CFMT.org). I was called upon to be an advocate for this student and his family by writing a proposal and evaluation substantiating his need plus the potential benefits of studying with Belmont Academy. He studied with me successfully for two terms before CFMT changed their funding rules.

And if this is not enough life experience to be considered for the Teach Tennessee program, I maintain an informative website for my students and their parents (see http://88keys.8m.net). It has been developed over the last 3-4 years as an aid to enrollees and prospective students, as well as a source for educational articles and opinions on pedagogy. I taught myself HTML in order to build this site, and continue to keep current on topics of interest to webmasters such as search engine optimization through newsletters like SiteProNews and Entireweb Newsletter. In my work for the chemistry journa, although it is not explicitly an educational endeavor, I am on a computer all day long, in touch with scientists around the world as well as other editorial offices and the ACS headquarters in Washington DC. As mentioned, I utilize technology to assist authors in getting their work published. The ACS has several databases, which are all synchronized: EWS (Editor Website), Paragon (for authors and readers), and Omnis 7 PR+ (peer review plus). I routinely use Adobe Acrobat, the Microsoft Office Suite (Excel, Word, PowerPoint, etc.), several mail programs (Mac Mail, Thunderbird, Entourage), a variety of web browsers (Firefox, Mozilla, Camino, Opera) and GIF/JPG editors such as Graphic Converter.

James Arthur Weinberg teaches piano, organ and theory at Belmont Academy, a division of Belmont University in Nashville TN. He is also organist at Belmont Heights Baptist Church and is an active wedding consultant and performer in middle Tennessee, paired with Highland Bagpiper Greg Cutcliff as the duo "The Highlanders." More about Nashville Celtic Weddings may be found at http://campus.belmont.edu/weinbergj

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