Music - ETM-LA

Education Through Music-Los Angeles partners with inner-city schools with the mission to provide and promote music in disadvantaged schools as part of the core curriculum for every child to enhance students' academic achievement and creative and overall development.

In-School Music Education Programs Our primary activity is forming long-term partnerships with Los Angeles County schools to help districts and school principals establish and sustain school-wide music education programs steeped in Common Core Standards that serve every student. ETM-LA is an independent 501(c)3 non-profit organization and a licensed affiliate implementing the ETM model in Los Angeles County.

We form long-term partnerships with inner-city elementary and middle schools that lack the resources for school-wide music programs. Music is taught both as a subject in its own right and as a means of supporting learning in other areas. We collaborate with principals and districts to develop partnerships that employ the following components to reinforce music's role as a core subject:

• Music instruction for every child that is weekly, yearlong, and follows a skills-based, comprehensive and sequential curriculum.
• Integration to support learning in a range of academic areas with a focus in Common Core Strategies.
• Professional development to improve instruction and understanding of arts education in the school community.
• Enrichment opportunities, such as concerts, private lessons and summer camp scholarships.
• Evaluation and assessment.
• Parent and community involvement.
• Long-term planning for sustaining instruction.

ETM-LA hires music teachers and teaching artists to serve as music faculty where needed, so that each partner school can provide weekly music instruction to every student, both general and special education, regardless of talent or ability. Current disciplines we provide include violin, cello, guitar, chorus, general music, and recorder.

We work with a variety of collaborating organizations to provide enrichment opportunities to students.  We provide ongoing training and mentoring to the music teachers and any district music teachers in place at our schools; professional development to academic teachers; and one-on-one and group leadership and strategic planning guidance to principals. We speak at parent meetings. We assess programs through ongoing communication, skills assessments, observation rubrics, surveys and other analysis.