Ken Petress: The Importance Of Music In Schools

Cannery Row is a town located in Monterey, California. Despite being small, dirty and crowded, it is a well functioned town and is home to people from different walks of life. In the novel’s prologue, John Steinbeck wrote the following: “Its inhabitants are, as one man once said, ‘whores, pimps, gamblers, and sons of bitches’ by which he meant Everybody” and “[have] the man looked through another peephole he might have said: ‘Saints and angels and martyrs and holy men,’ and he would have meant the same thing” (Steinbeck 1). He basically comments that the difference in viewpoints given the same event results from the power of perspective and duality observed in people. One might see Cannery Row as a low-down place while the others might see Cannery Row as a lively, vigorous town. One would see a character’s actions disputable while the others would see their behaviors admirable. The viewpoints of the readers and the way characters behave at various times explain the fact that Cannery Row and its inhabitants possess qualities crossing good and evil.

Fees for maintaining fields and courts, buying equipment, and paying coaches, is all money that is not put forward to improving the school environment and the teaching inside classrooms. In Amanda Ripley’s article from “The Case Against High School Sports” she argues in favor of schools diminishing or excluding organized sports. In her article she mentions the cost of a student versus an athlete, “the school was spending $328 a student for math instruction and more than four times that much for cheerleading -- $1348 a cheerleader.” She later includes that this was a school that claimed that math was their primary focus. Schools are spending sometimes quadruple the amount of money of athletes than on students.

Are schools the right place for sports? This is a question that educators and experts everywhere are asking themselves, as more and more schools are faced with budget cuts and low academic scores. No one is debating the health benefits of exercise one receives from sports, but does the exercise benefit outweigh the expense, risk, and impact on academic grades? Amanda Ripley, the author of The Smartest Kids in the World, thinks club organizations, not schools, should provide sports programming (“Should schools eliminate sports” 1). Earl Smith, author of “Race, Sport and the American Dream,” along with Ripley believes sports are given priority in some schools, drawing attention away from education (“Should schools eliminate sports” 1). During an interview with the New York Times, Smith stated “high schools should not have competitive sports teams. And especially not in the under-resourced intercity high schools where academic programs are often sacrificed to finance sports teams” (“Making Sports an After-School Activity” 1). He went on to say “even the student bodies in many high schools have developed cultures that glorify sports at the expense of the scholar.”

In Joanne Lipman’s “A Musical Fix for U.S. Schools”, she describes the benefits music can bring to a student’s IQ that allows them to perform superior in school. Music forces a person to think differently than how they usually may in other classes. This allows for new thinking strategies to form, improving the cognitive side of the mind. This positive difference is shown when a canadian study was done with music training where the results showed an increase in IQ in the group of people children studied (Lipman). With that study, the favorable results of music is clear for children. An IQ measures the intelligence of people, which is related to the cognitive abilities of the mind, and therefore the person. People may think that music may

* ““95% percent of Americans believe that music is a key-component in a child’s well-rounded education, 80% percent of respondents agreed that music makes the participants smarter; 78% believe that learning a musical instrument helps students perform better in other subject areas; and 88% believe participation in music helps teach children discipline” (Hurley 3),” (par 1).

For the past 50 years in America, schools have made it a tradition to play sports in schools. But schools have been crushing the future for their students because they allow sports in schools. While students and parents feel that sports in schools are appropriate and valuable, that is just simply not the case and schools have just gone too far. Schools should eliminate sports programs because sports programs put a financial burden on schools, getting rid of sports will increase in academics and students can get injured when playing sports.

The importance and benefits of school sports have been questioned recently, a current article has showed that both students and schools have improved as a result of limiting athletic programs. Therefore, schools should get rid of sports to cut big costs, eliminate distractions from students and staff, and improve student academic achievement.

Schools should keep their sports programs because sports help with academic achievements. Kids have more focus when they get physical activity. When kids get that activity it releases the hormones that have building up in your body. A quotes from Scholastic Should Your School Get Rid of Sports it said, “When you’re stressed,

Schools have been debating on whether or not it's a good idea to have after school sports. Studies have shown, that removing after school activities can save large sums of money and with most students showing improved their focus and grades. Therefore, schools should ban sports to cut costs, improve grades, and provide homework time.

The study found that when developing students are learning to play and instrument that they develop the ability to not just hear and appreciate the sounds of music differently but also process the sounds in a different way compared to kids of the same age not learning an instrument. This is due to learn to play an instrument help develop neurophysiological distinction which has been linked to aid and boost literacy and this which possibly improve success in academics. A quote that I believe is really great in driving home this point is by Nina Kraus in her book “Frontiers in Psychology” and that quote is, “We like to say that making music matters, Because it is only through the active generation and manipulation of sound that music can rewire the brain.” And she was saying this after hosting a study at Northwestern’s Auditory Neuroscience Lab. And the experiment was to see if a music appreciation class had the same effect as actually learning and participating in band class. And they found that the kids that were in the process of learning an instrument has better of improved neural processing skills than the students who were only in music appreciation group.

Perhaps the most tangible benefit of music education for students is the increase in their performance in the classroom. People often say, “Music makes you smarter,” but where is the evidence? As South Dakota State University’s Professor Kevin Kessler eloquently stated via email, “How were you

The atlantic website qoutes “ Research shows that schools with strong athletic programs have higher test scores and lower dropout rates.”Than in the article “Should schools cut sports”?It states “being a student today is a lot harder than ever. You are being held to tougher academic standards-and so is your school.The stress can get so intense,it feels paralyzing.That's why schools should keep their sports because school sports help improve academics, students have better grades on tests.

In the sports article it distinctly states, “For home games, schools often pay for security, painting the lines on the field, and cleaning up” which costs the school a fortune (Ripley 11). While sports teams are traveling there are costs to cover such as “buses for the team, the band, and the cheerleaders, not to mention meals and hotels for the road” (Ripley 11). This shows that schools spend too much money on sports teams and should invest more money on other extracurricular activities. As shown, schools should painstakingly start to spend more money in other academic activities other than

Many people believe that the arts, specifically music programs, hold no beneficial value to students other than for an extracurricular activity. Others believe that having these programs within our schools, only takes away from instructional time. However, research has shown that music education, and exposure to music in general, provides great benefits and values to the adolescents that are involved in said programs (“Music Matters”). Participation in music programs promotes the advancement of academic scores and sets students on the path to success later in life. Furthermore, these programs, be it instrumental or vocal, provide an outlet for adolescents to express themselves and have truly lasting implications on their global development. Notwithstanding all of the pleasure and self-confidence gained through participation in music programs, music education may provide important benefits towards students’ academics by improving their concentration levels and cultivating higher order thinking skills that may increase academic achievement.

Imagine you’re a teenager in a high school who is involved in athletics, and sports are the one thing you love doing the most. Now imagine that one day out of nowhere your sports team was cut, and the one thing that you so deeply loved you are no longer able to do. A lot of people wonder if sports are too much of a priority in schools, and whether or not they should be cut. Students disagree that sports are too much of a priority, and claim athletics make them the person that they are, and that they wouldn’t be the same without sports. School districts should not cut sport programs because they benefit students, they bring in money and publicity to the school, and it gives the students a fit and healthy lifestyle.