Survey shows Western students less likely to be enrolled in music classes

Liv Ames for EdSource

These transitional kindergarten students at Figarden Elementary in Fresno are learning about rhythm.

Liv Ames for EdSource

These transitional kindergarten students at Figarden Elementary in Fresno are learning about rhythm.

Susan Frey

May 21, 2015

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A national survey of teachers and parents found that students in the West have lower rates of enrollment in music classes and fewer minutes a week of required music education. Yet Western teachers and parents feel more strongly than those in other regions that music and arts education should be considered a core academic subject, the researchers found.

“There is a disconnect in the Western region in some of the aspirations teachers and parents have for music education and the on-the-ground reality that teachers and students face,” said Peter Grunwald, lead author of the study, which was published April 27.

The survey — Striking a Chord: The Public’s Hopes and Beliefs for K-12 Education in the United States: 2015 – was conducted by Grunwald Associates for the National Association of Music Merchants. NAMM is a nonprofit based in Carlsbad that works to advance active participation in music.

Grunwald said in elementary school, there’s a significantly greater percentage of students enrolled in music in the Northeast, Midwest and South. In middle and high school, both the West and South have a smaller percentage of students enrolled. The West required fewer minutes of music education compared to all the other regions, he said.

Armalyn De La O, director of the RIMS California Arts Project and who was involved in developing national education standards for music, said she was not surprised by the regional differences.

The lack of music classes in schools in California “has been the case for a while now,” De La O said in an email. However, she said, this year 181 music position openings have been posted on EdJoin, on online job listing site for educators, “which is a huge increase from past years.”

“I hope this is a sign that music education is coming back with the Local Control Funding Formula,” she said. “But there’s no proof just yet.”

The initial survey took place in January and February and included 1,000 teachers and 800 parents. The researchers then conducted 295 additional interviews with African-American parents and 276 more with Latino parents to have robust sample sizes for those groups. The researchers found that African-American and Latino parents generally feel music provides more benefits to children than other parents do.

Altogether, 22 percent of teachers and 20 percent of parents interviewed were from the West. California parents and teachers each made up 10 percent of the total respondents nationally. The western region included California, Washington, Oregon, Arizona, Colorado, Nevada, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico, Alaska, Utah and Wyoming.

The survey also found that 77 percent of teachers and 64 percent of parents say access to music and arts education is extremely or very important, yet only 34 percent of teachers and 45 percent of parents consider music a core academic subject. In the West, the percentages of respondents who consider music a core academic subject were higher: 43 percent of teachers and 51 percent of parents.

In addition, the survey found that:

• Urban parents and teachers feel they are not getting as much access to quality music programs as suburban districts do.
• Schools that rely on Title I federal funding for low-income children generally lag non-Title I schools in many indicators of quality in music education, both parents and teachers said. In addition, awareness that Title I funds can be used for music education is generally low.
• According to parents, 1 in 6 children has had no music instruction at all.

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