Does Music Education Have a Poverty Problem?

In this literature review, I explore poverty, the barriers to participation that exist for students in poverty, and why this issue should matter to music educators. Research findings about students and poverty generally fall into three categories: logistics, teacher attitudes, and policy. I identify participation barriers in each of these categories and offer suggestions how they might be addressed. Overall, findings involving poverty and music education indicate that when teachers are well-supported at the micro and macro level by legislators, administrators, parents, and other teachers, most barriers can be reduced or eliminated, and participation increases.

Recognizing the Inequalities in Remote Learning Education

The COVID-19 pandemic has altered the instructional approach in K-12 and institutions of higher education to be almost solely online. The challenges for schools at the beginning of the pandemic were immense. Schools faced issues such as not having a plan for families to access WiFi, students not having one-to-one devices at home, parents working at home without anyone to help students log in, special education population/disabled students unable to acquire adequate learning services, and students in poverty or experiencing homelessness who were helpless to quarantine and did not know where their next meal would come from. The closing of school doors exacerbated the historical and pervasive educational inequities and generational implications within marginalized communities. Given the tense relationships and not-great experiences with an education that many marginalized families have had, remote learning progression was a rocky one.

Reaching and Teaching Students in Poverty

The second edition of Reaching and Teaching Students in Poverty: Strategies for Erasing the Opportunity Gap aims to move educators from a deficit view of students experiencing poverty to a structural view by examining the structural inequalities in the United States. This book encourages educators to develop equity literacy and provides twelve principles of equity literacy, supported by historical data and current research, to guide readers in this process. The book also offers actionable strategies to implement at the classroom, school, and district level.