STEM to STEAM: The Essential Subject of Music Education

          

The entire buzz in education right now is STEM. This acronym for science, technology, engineering, and math has been gaining more power in an effort to increase the chances for success of young Americans in a global economy. At first glance this initiative seems like it would be positive for the learning environments of students but something is missing. With this focus of STEM and budget cuts occurring, music education in high schools is being overlooked. Convincing my readers that music education is essential in the learning process of becoming successful adults is my goal, you the readers are the solution. The goal is changing STEM to STEAM. 

I first want to give a little background on my involvement in music. I went to high school in a small central Iowa town where music was quite established as being successful. I started to play the trumpet in 5th grade and continue to play today, in Iowa State's Wind Ensemble and Symphony Orchestra. What playing the trumpet taught me is indescribable. The confidence, friendships, and things you learn through music have made me into the person I am today. I didn't really participate in sports so music was my personal outlet to show people what I was good at. I've also been given the opportunity to travel to Europe for band once in high school and will be on tour with the Iowa State Wind Ensemble this summer in Europe. Music was a very good experience for me as a student and as a person as a whole and I truly believe this would be the case for the majority of students.

Performing High School Band 

Albert Einstein once said, "Logic will get you from A to B. Imagination will take you everywhere." Music makes students think abstractly, in a way they do not normally do throughout the school day. Each time a piece of music is played, it is different than the time before. Music is made through the emotional choices and the musical imagination of the student. There are no boundaries for learning when it comes to music.

According to Webster's Dictionary music is "the science or art of ordering tones or sounds in succession, in combination, and in temporal relationships to produce a composition having unity and continuity." Music is a science. It is exact, specific, a conductor's score is a graph that requires specific harmonies, and it requires exact control of time and tempo. Music is mathematical. It has rhythms that are subdivided into fractions of their original value. Music is a foreign language. A great portion of musical terms are in German, Italian, French and Latin. Music is a physical education. Music requires precise coordination of the fingers, eyes, hands, arms, lips, tongue, diaphragm, and facial muscles. Music is an art. Music is created through the emotions of the individual who is playing it. It combines all subjects into one. It can only enrich the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics guided curriculum. "Musically trained students can do several things at once mentally." (Deutsch)

According to the National Education Association, "If the United States is to hold a competitive edge in a rapidly changing global workforce, bolstering the nation's STEM workforce is essential." With an endorsement like this how could music education really be essential in the learning process. Looking into the NEA's values we see that they might actually be going against themselves. They believe that every student has the right to education that develops their potential, independence, and character. How is this done through only STEM? Is it actually possible to develop these things by simply doing "technical" studies? The answer is no. There is no way that a student can develop themselves as a person without some sort of creative catalyst. What better way to develop creativity and character than music. The Ohio Alliance for Arts Education seems to agree. In their article STEM to STEAM they say that, "Music and the arts are essential educational components for all students to learn and to be successful in the global economy." We need to integrate music education into STEM to give our students the best opportunities to succeed. The State of Iowa and National education codes recognize music education as one of the core courses in high school.

To get a better understanding of why music education is essential we need to analyze STEM. STEM's main focus is to get students to do better on standardized tests and to better prepare them for college and future jobs. This seems like a completely logic thing to do but by only focusing on science, technology, engineering, and math we lose focus on one big key idea of learning. As a student you need to learn how to solve all sorts of problems not just technical ones. Although STEM can give you the backbone of solving the problems, music can force students to teach themselves how to solve all sorts of problems. The keyword here is "how". This comprehension of knowing how to solve problems is critical in a students future learning process. "Music teaches students basic skills in a more abstract way." (Catterall) To show this we will be looking at a study from the Louisiana Department of Education.

Figure 1

Richard Baker from the Louisiana Department of Education did a test out of 38,000 eighth grade students from Louisiana. In this study Baker analyzed the scores of students enrolled in music courses and those that were not for the Louisiana Standardized Tests. The study showed that students enrolled in music courses scored on average 6-8 points higher than those students that were not enrolled in music courses. See Figure 1 for graph from the study. Now even with this study showing that music does in fact help students with standardized tests some people are still not convinced that music isn't worth keeping because of budget cutting. "There is no reason to believe that allocating less time to music would lead to greater school success" (Wilkens).

With budget cuts happen around the country, because of the state of the economy, people think that they need to cut music. Public schools actually get funding based off how many students are enrolled and how well they perform on standardized tests. If studies show that music is actually helping students get better scores then why would you want to get rid of it, it's making the school more money. So music education in high schools is giving students the chance to gain independence and build character while making the school money. Liane Rockley gives a better understanding of this.

"No one is against music education." This was said by Liane Rockley a music advocator from Lakewood, Colorado. She went on a trip to Washington, D.C with the National Association of Music Merchants to debate for music education. She learned that people in Washington believe that music education is important but that it is "easy to give it a backseat to all the other demands" (Rockley). Her main concern is that if music education isn't provided in public schools that not many students will get a chance to participate in it because of the high cost of private lessons. With nobody being against music in Washington we need to think of a solution to provide all students with the opportunities of music education.

For the most part I have been discussing why music should be in high schools but I want to talk about what is gives each student beyond improved standardized test scores. I've already touched based with the fact that it gives students the ability to learn how to problem solve from its source instead of just teaching a student how to do something, but I want to get into the responsibility you learn, confidence, and overall character you get from music. According to the assistant band director at West Marshall High School, Brandon Weeks, students gain responsibility by having to take care of their instruments and learning their music for themselves and for the other ensemble members. Confidence is gained by having to learn how to play something over and over again and slowly getting better until they can play it correctly. He also said that when comparing a band student to someone that isn't in band that band kids generally seem to have a better attitude, better grades, and seems to be more happy and friendly. Mr. Weeks also talked about it giving students a since of accomplishment and an identity in high school when they might not have been an athlete or an honor roll student. These are the things that we want our students to come out of high school with to be ready for the real world.

Now that we know that music education integrated with STEM helps students achieve higher standardized test scores and that it makes students more rounded and knowledgeable citizens, we need to help make it important enough in the eyes of schools to not get rid of it. This is where you, my readers, come in. When you have children make sure that you create a positive learning environment for them that includes music. This will make them overall a more rounded person. Through being more creative, goal oriented, problem solving driven, confident and many other things music education in a student's life is 100% necessary. By people simply talking about music education as being important and getting parents involved people will have to start listening. Getting students to become successful adults is the goal and now you must go and reach out to the public. The solution to this problem is simple. All we have to do is talk about it. Slowly but surely the small spark of talking will become a full fire of debate that music needs to be in schools. By getting more and more individuals and groups involved in music education advocacy it will soon not be the backdoor of education but near the front of a students learning curriculum. You can visit the National Association for Music Education's website for more information. 

Works Cited

Baker, Richard. Arts Education Policy Review. 2011, Vol. 113 Issue 1, p17-25. 9p.

Catteral, James. 1997. Champions of Change, Americans for the Arts Monograph, I. 26-50

Deutsch, Diana. 2010. Hearing the Music, Honing the mind. The Scientific American, 4. 22-26.

Rockley, Liane. American Music Teacher. Aug/Sep2009, Vol. 59 Issue 1, p23-23. 1p.

Weeks, Brandon. Personal interview.  7 April. 2013.

Wilkins, Jesse. Journal of Curriculum Studies. Nov2003, Vol. 35 Issue 6, p721-734. 14p.