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Date: 6/27/2022
SOUTH HADLEY – Acting Superintendent Dr. Mark McLaughlin defended the district’s plan to cut and consolidate music instruction positions at a recent School Committee meeting, explaining the move was not part of an effort to end programs such as middle school band and chorus.
With music instructors retiring from their positions, McLaughlin and school leadership proposed consolidating two positions into one at Michael E. Smith Middle School. General music instruction would be available for Grades 5-8. Band and chorus would remain, he said, contrary to fears raised by parents during the public comment portion of the meeting. Those activities, however, would be made possible as stipended positions.
A job posting for the music teacher position was posted on the education job board SchoolSpring on June 10. The listing does not include a salary and states only that “there will be stipends available for after-school chorus and band.” The district is also seeking a new middle school principal and McLaughlin noted whoever is chosen for that position should have input on the operations of the music program.
McLaughlin took responsibility for his part in creating the confusion regarding the change, but he strongly opposed the notion that there was an effort to end music programs in the district, stating there wasn’t “a hint of a thought” of eliminating any arts programming.
“My entire career has been supportive of literature and the arts. I’ve been a humanities director everywhere I’ve been in addition to an English language arts department head or coordinator or whatever. I’ve written music and arts curriculums. Nobody needs to tell me the importance of the arts,” he said. “This is not an anti-arts move. This is a move that’s attempting to balance the obligations we have to provide reasonable and financially defensible positions – by positions I mean points of view – while we are also trying to build and rebuild.”
Acting Assistant Superintendent Jennifer Voyek added that she was a member of band and choir from elementary school to high school and was an advocate for the arts. She contended that the proposal would ensure the band program could continue.
“It may look like it’s pulling back, but the reevaluation of the program is so that we could find ways to build it back up,” she said. “I would hate that we’re having a conversation two or three years from now and we’re saying, ‘We just don’t have any interest in music anymore and so how can we even have a band at all?’ I think by taking the time to look at it and figuring out ways to build it back up, my hope is we’re having a conversation in the next couple of years saying, ‘Wow, look, we’ve doubled our numbers. We’ve found a way to excite students into coming back to the arts and trying band and trying choir.’ I just hope that our community can trust that we really have the best interest in this program and we’re just trying take the time to look at the best way to move forward.”
Later in the meeting, McLaughlin also acknowledged discussions such as these conjure “specters of cuts and the past.”
“I would just urge people to recognize that that doesn’t have to be the future. Indiscriminate cuts, that’s not the wave of the future,” he said, “This is about trying to balance responsibility with program maintenance and building and sometimes it takes time and a little bit of alteration to figure that out.”
After hearing strong opposition from three members of the public during the public comment portion of the meeting, McLaughlin continuously stressed to the committee that there were no plans to change the offerings of band and chorus, repeatedly using the term “service delivery change” when describing the move. The acting superintendent admitted that he “misread the impact that a service delivery change would have on people who are rightly very invested in the music program,” but the asserted the facts had been misconstrued or misunderstood by the public.
“What’s been distressing to me through this is the assumption that people have made that band is going to be eliminated or there are efforts afoot to undermine it. I opened the district up for that by not being more clear in the beginning as to what the plan was,” he said. “Having said that, there is no plan to change the offerings of band and chorus. There is, rather, a proposed change in the service delivery model, but not in the program itself … I want to be clear – there is a difference between a change in a service delivery model and elimination of a service.”
While residents voiced concerns that the number of children participating in music would dwindle as a result of the move, McLaughlin contended the move was rooted not only in financial considerations, but also student involvement, asserting that enrollment in music programs had been experiencing “steady decline” for years.
“This is in response to that reality – it didn’t create that reality,” McLaughlin said of the plan, later noting the coronavirus pandemic was a “kick in the pants” to arts programming in the district overall.
The determination to consolidate the positions was reached after determining the previous model was unsustainable. The decision was not an easy one, he stressed.
“As the acting superintendent, it’s sort of been characterized as the easy thing to do here is the low-hanging fruit. Nothing is easy about trying to make choices. But people in this position are required to do that,” he said. “And the fact of the matter is if we had content area classes – academic classes – with a total of 15 students shared among two teachers, people would rightly ask the question, ‘Is that sustainable?’ So we have through the opportunity presented by retirement [a chance] to reevaluate what we’re doing with our programming and whether or not it can be done differently from general music right on to band and chorus.”
He added district leadership had discussions recently on how to strengthen the music programs district-wide, starting with Mosier Elementary School. Committee member Dr. Lynda Pickbourn asked what that rebuilding effort would look like. McLaughlin responded that he didn’t know the cause and therefore could not offer a remedy and at this point, the district needed to investigate the problem with participation.
“Anytime there seems to be a decline in interest or participation in any given program – if it’s an elective at the high school – there always has to be the question, ‘Why is that?’ I’m not prepared to say why that is. I know we have excellent instruction,” he said.
While stating he could not make any specific recommendations at this time, McLaughlin said he wanted to bring a “concentrated music program” to the earlier grades with a “natural progression” to the middle school level and eventually to the high school. He suggested a possible avenue could be to make general music instruction more hands-on with earlier introduction of instruments.
“We all want the parades and the fullness of that cultural moment for students. We recognize the connection of music and the arts and content studies and mathematics and all that,” McLaughlin said.
When asked by committee member Eric Freisner what changes in service delivery might look like, McLaughlin said timing would be the biggest change. Some sessions, he theorized, would have to be rescheduled to before or after school hours as opposed to during the school day. He also said there could be whole band and instrument group practices a couple of days a week and individual instruction on others. He added timing may depend on who is hired and also suggested success would be somewhat dependent on parents’ ability and willingness to adapt.
“What we, I think, as educators need to do more than ever is not automatically default to what was and then to perpetuate that into the future,” McLaughlin said. “I think that we need to constantly reevaluate and if what was works and continues to work, outstanding, and if what was could be improved upon, we should be able to talk about it and then to join together in the spirit of partnership to solve it.”
Committee member Danielle Cooke said as a parent of a rising fifth grader, she knew there was a greater number of extracurricular activities at the middle school level and suggested a stronger effort overall to boost participation. McLaughlin said he appreciated the conversation, but added a message is being sent to the district from the students themselves.
“We talk about student voice and choice and student agency, this is a case where … the numbers are what the numbers are and students are telling us, they’re using their voice, choice and agency by not selecting,” he said. “It could be that they don’t know. Knowing some of the players involved, particularly at the middle school, I would find it hard to believe that there hasn’t been an effort to express the opportunities and so on because there are a lot of passionate people up there, but nevertheless, that could be it.”
McLaughlin later reiterated the point, stating that children now have more options and in order to stay relevant, public schools must remain current and to do so they should “talk to the customer a little bit.”
Chair Allison Schlachter told the committee in a recent professional conversation about social-emotional health, the role the arts and music play was a significant talking point and the concept of a musical instrument for every young student as part of the curriculum was suggested.
“I do think there is a correlation – we’re in a mental health crisis and we’re seeing less and less kids involved in the arts. I can’t help but think that if we could increase these programs, we might see happier kids. So, I am totally supportive of doing whatever we think will build these programs back up,” she said, adding arts programs such as performing arts were a source of pride for the community.