About Us
Our mission is to empower youth with lifelong skills through music making and building community.
ComMUSICation builds relationships among
St. Paul Promise Neighborhood residents by utilizing community partners through
an intensive afterschool youth development choral program encouraging family
involvement and community engagement. Our goals are:
·
To
provide a high-quality, intensive music education opportunity that
demographically represents St. Paul Promise Neighborhood
·
To
build community across schools, cultures, and in greater St. Paul through frequent
community performances
·
To
build relationships among St. Paul Promise Neighborhood residents by utilizing
community partners through an intensive afterschool youth development choral
program encouraging family involvement and community engagement
Inspired by the internationally renowned
El Sistema movement, ComMUSICation (CMC) has begun to fill a cultural void due
to the dearth of secular youth choral programs in St. Paul, and CMC is
succeeding in filling that void by providing a rare quality artistic choral
program consisting of a majority of children of color, mostly Hmong, Latino,
and African-American youth, students who often have limited choral experience
and who were, heretofore, excluded from this opportunity. CMC has begun to empower youth and
families in one of the most disadvantaged areas in St. Paul by successfully removing
the barriers of tuition and transportation, and CMC requires no audition.
Service
Demographics from Pilot Program Feb-May 2014
Asian 10%
Latino 10%
African-American 65%
Middle Eastern 5%
Caucasian 10%
10% 5th Grade
40% 4th Grade
45% 3rd Grade
5% 2nd Grade
95% Girls
5% Boys
30% Charter Schools
70% Traditional St. Paul Public Schools
This Project
A
Storybook of Songs: Daniel Pinkwater’s “The Big Orange Splot”
Help support us as we put
our creative minds to the test to compose our very first original opera based
on Daniel Pinkwater’s beloved children’s book, The Big Orange Splot about celebrating diversity and accepting people for who they are in response to a conversation we had about bullying last spring. Special guests from Minnesota
Opera will guide us along the way as our young
musicians explore themes of bullying, individuality, diversity and acceptance.
Funds will help us fund MN Opera artists, CMC teaching artists, supplies for puppets, and music.
The Impact
The largest impact CMC has are the character skills students built through the process of learning music, both as an individual (focus, discipline, responsibility, etc.) and as part of an ensemble (cooperation, teamwork, problem solving, etc.). Students receive badges when they have attained a certain character skill and can identify how they have earned it. Teaching character is the largest impact we will have because these skills are transferrable to other areas of life and according to Paul Tough’s How Children Succeed, skills like perseverance are a more predictive factor for life success including high school graduation, college readiness, less likely for teen pregnancy, drugs, high school dropout etc. than any other factor (GPA, mentoring, tutoring, etc.). By focusing on 3rd-6th graders, a pivotal time to engage students in school, CMC provides a fun, but educational outlet to keep kids engaged in school and aids in the transition to middle school. Longer-term, CMC can be instrumental in helping close the Twin Cities’ achievement gap, our nation’s largest.
Other Ways You Can Help
If you can't personally donate, we understand, but you can:
* Like us on Facebook Www.facebook.com/commusicationmn
* Send an email to your friends to check out our campaign
*Volunteer at an upcoming event (Contact vista@commusicationmn.org)
*Have your employer match gifts or help sponsor a performance
