By Stephen Weir
When faculty began this week in Scarborough, there was a sure musical magic round three junior colleges that was not there again in June when faculty went on summer time trip. Alexander Stirling Public College, George Peck Public College, and John McCrae Public College have come into some surprising cash this week for his or her music applications. The downtown Jarvis highschool can be celebrating.
The colleges are sharing in a cross-Canada million-dollar reward from the nation’s main music training charity, MusiCounts, which introduced that 74 colleges throughout Canada will obtain $1 million price of musical devices, tools, and kit. That is all a part of MusiCounts’ faculty funding applications—the MusiCounts Band Support Program and the MusiCounts Slaight Household Basis Innovation Fund.
As college students return to the classroom, faculty music training throughout the nation is in a important state of disrepair. Many faculty music applications are under-resourced as they attempt to adapt to the evolving wants and pursuits of scholars. Fifty-eight of the 2024 MusiCounts College Funding recipient colleges indicated that the success of their program hinges on receiving a MusiCounts grant. Although MusiCounts is pleased with the optimistic impression it makes in colleges throughout the nation, it’s only capable of help about 1 in each 5 colleges that utilized for assist this 12 months.
“MusiCounts is thrilled to welcome college students again to highschool and again to music with the funding of $1 million price of much-needed devices and kit,” stated Kristy Fletcher, President of MusiCounts. “As college students return to the music classroom, they’ll not solely discover guitars, drums, horns, and turntables, they’ll additionally discover a protected area of their faculty the place they’ll join with their friends, construct their confidence, and discover their voice.”
At Jarvis Collegiate Institute in Toronto, a lot of the varsity’s inhabitants identifies as BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and folks of color). The college hosted a workshop exploring hip-hop tradition and music. Whereas there was great scholar curiosity, the varsity wasn’t capable of additional develop culturally related programming like this with out extra funding. With the MusiCounts grant, the varsity is introducing a brand new DJ and hip-hop program to feed college students’ curiosity.
4 different Toronto colleges additionally obtained help from MusiCounts this week.
