Regina Public Schools CEO addresses concerns around changes to elementary band program

Concerns are continuing to circulate around changes coming to Regina Public Schools’ elementary band program in the next school year.

The changes include mandatory band for Grade 6 students and a new music centre at the former Dieppe School, where Grade 7 and Grade 8 band students would be bussed for classes.

Read more:

• Regina public school band changes strike sour note with Sask. music groups
• Regina Public expands band program with new music hub at former Dieppe School
• Regina Public Schools approves band cuts, denies parent group appeal

980 CJME recently attended a town hall meeting and heard from a variety of community members who said they are worried about inclusivity, access to instruments and the space available at the Dieppe Music Centre. Some also raised concerns that the band program will eventually be phased out altogether.

In an exclusive interview with 980 CJME, Mark Haarmann, Regina Public Schools’ director of education and CEO, responded to the concerns.

The current band program

Haarmann said the band program begins with recruitment in Grade 5. Students get a brief introduction to instruments, with roughly 41 per cent of those students choosing to take Grade 6 band.

Those students are then taken out of regular classes to attend band classes at their home schools, and they also travel to local high schools for group sectional studies.

In some cases, there aren’t enough students in a school taking part in the band program, so Haarmann said the students are transferred to another school in the community in order to participate in band.

Why isn’t the band program working?

A high drop-out rate for band – about 60 per cent within two years – is a growing concern for Haarmann. He said many band students are pulled out of core subjects such as math, reading, writing and science, and are left to catch up on their own. He said this is an issue middle-level teachers struggle with, as they need to help band students catch up on missed lessons while also continuing to move the rest of the class forward.

“We hear from kids who’ve left the program,” Haarmann said.

“The most common reason is that kids are missing class time that they don’t want to miss, and there’s no standard set of subjects missed. It’s sort of done at the site level, and its not consistent across different schools.”

What are the biggest changes?

Haarmann said the new program will give every Grade 6 student the chance to participate in band. He said they will get between 10 and 15 lessons, with three to five visits to the music centre during the school year.

Haarmann said Regina Public Schools has also had conversations about possibly bringing other instruments into the program, including guitars and keyboards, in the future.

“It’s an exciting time to think sort of outside what has been a very traditional program for decades. There certainly is a role for those instruments, but what we’re saying here, and to answer your question, is that we’re thinking bigger. We’re thinking broader,” Haarmann said.

He said kids who choose to continue the band program in Grade 7 and Grade 8 will be able to make a more informed decision after the mandatory Grade 6 program, which he hopes will help improve retention rates.

Why are these changes the right approach?

Haarmann said he believes the changes will address the high drop-out rate and create a program that allows all students to succeed.

With provincial assessments coming soon, he said there will be a new focus on literacy and numeracy, and the school division needs to think about the band program in the context of the larger education system.

“I think if you ask most parents, what they want is they want their kids to be able to read at grade level, do math at grade level, pursue science, technology skills, be able to go to either the University of Saskatchewan, Sask. Polytech or into a trade, basically ready to come out of school to take their next step in their schooling, and/or the world of work,” Haarmann said.

While band, athletics, drama and the arts also support students after they graduate, Haarmann said the school division has heard from teachers and principals that the core curriculum is the priority, and the changes should help address the fact that students are sometimes taken out of core subjects for band.

What about the criticism the changes are drawing?

Haarmann said he believes there is a lot of misinformation about the changes, and he emphasized that the number of band teachers will stay the same after the changes take effect.

Regarding concerts, Haarmann said the trade-off is a new band program that will allow all students to experience band, with concerts continuing in Grade 7, Grade 8 and beyond.

Pointing to concerns around inclusivity and accessibility of the new program and the Dieppe School, Haarmann said the new band program will include every student and provide support plans for students who need special accommodations.

“The Dieppe site will be fully functional. Any student in Grade 6, 7, 8 who needs accommodations will have a plan developed by their school team, led by the principal, and that will obviously be implemented when heading to the Dieppe site as well,” Haarmann explained.

Haarmann noted the Dieppe School is fully accessible with only one floor. He said it’s “probably more accessible than many of our sites.”

How will the new band program change over time?

Haarmann said he believes the band program will evolve to better reflect students’ interests and the diversity in the community.

He suggested expanding beyond traditional band instruments like the trombone, flute, clarinet and saxophone to include options like Indigenous drumming, guitars, keyboards and modern music styles like techno-pop, as well as music embracing the city’s growing population of immigrants.

“It’s very exciting. I think it’s time to begin to think about music as something that reflects society, because schools, at the end of the day, reflect society,” said Haarmann.

“It is time to begin to reflect kids’ interests and begin to grow a program that, again, isn’t traditional, but I think that if we want to engage kids, and we want to engage the new Regina – which is kind of changing before our eyes – we have to begin to think about how can we do that, not only in all of our curriculum, but certainly in this music program as well.”

Haarmann said the new program will also create an opportunity for community groups to step up, pointing to academy programs run by partners like Regina Minor Football.

The school division plans to complete a review at the end of the first year of the new band program, Haarmann noted, as well as another at the end of the second year, with a larger review planned at the end of the third year to gauge the success of the changes.