"What about us?" Part 2

While I was only exposed to the public school system for two years, I'm very familar with the atmosphere and attitudes of administrators and teachers. Being the daughter of a retired band director who worked and taught for the Brownsville Independent School District for 30 years, I've pretty much seen it all, or at least heard about it.

This past weekend on our way to my little sister's last marching show of the season, my dad and I struck up a conversation about this blog and his experiences with his many "run-ins with the law". My father's always been the kind of person who, if he whole-heartedly believed in something, he was always going full force ahead. Always being a huge supporter of the arts (band in particular, of course), he never turned down an opportunity to talk up the advantages the arts provide in the lives of people, regardless of age. If you asked him, he'd tell you about how knowing how to read music will aid in math, reading, logic, common sense, problem solving, among others.

Of course, his opportunities to plug music and the arts aren't always presented in a way where he's not alone in advocating it. Most of the time, the only reason he brings the aforementioned points up in conversation is because people either don't know about the advantages or they simply don't want to believe them. The latter reason sounds somewhat outrageous but it's true; I've witnessed it myself, sadly most of these instances name a school administrator as the opposition.

A good example of one of these moments, I think, was when my dad took an ad out in The Brownsville Herald after a huge victory at a competition open to middle and high school bands across Texas. Out of over 30 bands from all over and out of the huge range of budgets (some districts provide private lessons for their music students free of charge, unlike BISD), my dad's band came out at the top, earning first place of all bands as well as the highest rating possible for their category. The ad was half a page in size, and although not in color, it cost an easy $300. That money came out of the band's fund and had nothing to do with the finances of the school or district. This is not a big deal until one considers how a football player might be featured in the paper with a huge color picture at no cost to the student, his school or organization.

Why is there a double standard? If there isn't, arts students sure feel there is. I was one of them not long ago.