Donors Choose project for my kids' Orchestra Program
2I tried to find one of the back-to-school funding threads to necro, but search was being less than helpful, so I’m just starting a new thread. I live in WV and my county is one of the few around here that has an orchestra program and it’s really fantastic. My daughter is in 7th grade and started playing violin in 4th (and recently started using a school-loaned viola to start learning it, also.) My son is in 5th, plays the viola, and also started in 4th. My daughter has been a member of the Middle School All-County Orchestra for two years (kids from all over the county audition) and I drove her across the state last month to audition with 40+ kids for one of 14 spots (for 2nd Violin) in the Middle School All-State Orchestra. She made it in, last chair, but she made it in! She was a nervous wreck and felt she really flubbed the audition, but she did well enough to squeak in.
Anyway, the one thing her school’s program lacks is basses. Funding for the Orchestra program is way down at the bottom of the list for county funding, so this need/want isn’t going to be met by them, and our fundraising this year is barely going to cover the costs of the buses for our festival trip for the kids to compete in the spring. Anything left over goes to cover the rosin, strings, and music Mrs. DelGallo buys.
Because of the size of basses, even if a parent rents a bass for their child to play, the only options for them are for the parent to drive them back and forth to school every day with the instrument, or leave the instrument at school all the time, which means they don’t get to practice at home. It’s the same for the cellos, as they also aren’t allowed on the buses, however, they are lucky enough to usually have enough donated cellos for the students to use at school so the parents don’t have to drive them back and forth every day.
If you think music education is important in schools, are financially able, and feel led to donate, please check out her project. Thanks!
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Feel free to necro these threads:
https://meh.com/forum/topics/cah-supports-donorschoose
https://meh.com/forum/topics/please-give-money-to-buy-books-for-poor-kids--or-dont--up-to-you
https://meh.com/forum/topics/its-that-time-of-year-again--lets-make-some-teachers-and-their-students-day
@PlacidPenguin Good grief. None of those were coming up when I was searching for “donors choose”. Either my search is broken, or the space was screwing it up. Thanks!
Wow…that much for one bass? (I played piano and bass drum!) Yes, I am clueless about instrument pricing…will donate on payday!
@mikibell Thank you! And yeah, instruments are crazy expensive, especially if you get a decent quality one. My guess is, though I’m not well-versed, the $1700 one she’s chosen is a decent enough quality to stand up to years worth of middle school kids playing it, but it probably wouldn’t be something a professional would use for concerts or gigs.
@mikibell I went to a school concert- the bass player was a little 4th grader. She dropped her bass and the neck broke off on stage. You could hear gasps across the theater. She still plays and is a lot bigger now.
My daughter’s cello got cracked at school- probably not anything she did. It cost close to a thousand bucks just to repair it, and it’s not a very good one.
@sammydog01 all my friends played either the flute or saxophone… I was the outlier…
Now I know why no one played the larger instruments!
I will say that is one area we are slacking on as parents…oh well…