Music Advocacy's Top Ten for Directors
- The 1997 Gallup Survey on Americans' attitudes
towards music revealed that eighty-six percent (86%) of
adults agree that all schools should offer instrumental
music as part of the regular curriculum. The same
percentage endorses community financial support for
school music education.
- Students with coursework/experience in music
performance scored 52 points higher on the verbal portion
of the SAT and 36 points higher on the math portion than
students with no coursework or experience in the arts.
- Profiles of SAT and Achievement Test Takers, The
College Board, 1998.
- A 1985 study by Edward Kvet showed that student
absence from class to study a musical instrument does not
result in lower academic achievement. He found no
academic achievement difference between sixth grade
students who were excused from class for instrumental
study and those who were not, matching variables of sex,
race, IQ, cumulative achievement, school attended, and
classroom teacher.
- Spin-Offs: The Extra-Musical Advantages of a Musical
Education, Cutietta, Hamann, and Walker (Elkhart, IN:
United Musical Instruments U.S.A., Inc., 1995).
- Researchers at the University of California-Irvine report
that second-grade students given four months of piano
keyboard training, as well as time playing newly designed
computer software, scored 27% higher on proportional
math and fractions tests than other children.
- Neurological Research, March 15, 1999; Shaw, Graziano,
and Peterson.
- The nation's top business executives agree that arts
education programs can help repair weaknesses in
American education and better prepare workers for the
21st century.
- "The Changing Workplace is Changing Our View of
Education," Business Week, October 1996.
- A study of 811 high school students indicated that the
proportion of minority students with a music teacher role
model was significantly larger than for any other discipline.
Thirty-six percent (36%) of these students identified music
teachers as their role model, as opposed to 28% English
teachers, 11% elementary teachers, 7% physical education/
sports teachers, 1% principals.
- "Music Teachers as Role Models for African-American
Students," D.L. Hamann and L.M. Walker, Journal of
Research in Music Education, 1993.
- Longer arts study means higher SAT scores. For
example, students participating in the arts for two years
averaged 29 points higher on the verbal portion and 18
points higher on the math portion of the SAT than
students with no coursework or experience in the arts.
Students with four or more years in the arts scored 57
points higher and 39 points higher on the verbal and math
portions respectively than students with no arts
coursework.
- Profiles of SAT and Achievement Test Takers, The
College Board, 1998.
- Admissions officers at 70 percent of the nation's major
universities have stated that high school credit and
achievement in the arts are significant considerations for
admission to their institutions.
- In a study of approximately 7,500 students at a medium-
size university between 1983 and 1988, music and music
education majors had the highest reading scores of any
students on campus, including those majoring in English,
biology, chemistry, and mathematics.
- "The Comparative Academic Abilities of Students in
Education and in Other Areas of a Multi-focus
University," Peter H. Wood, ERIC Document Number
ED327480.
- Physician and biologist Lewis Thomas studied the
undergraduate majors of medical school applicants. He
found that 66% of music majors who applied to medical
school were admitted, the highest percentage of any group.
Forty-four percent (44%) of biochemistry majors were
admitted.
- as reported in "The Case for Music in the Schools," Phi
Delta Kappan, February 1994.
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