Art & Design needs musical instuments

[Michael Higgins]

Friends of Art & Design High School is seeking a source for donations of
used or new musical instruments for the kids attending that school.

Art & Design is a New York City High School, located in Manhattan, that
draws its student enrollment from the City as a whole, based on
demonstrated artistic ability. Over half a century old, Art and Design
is dedicated to training kids in all aspects of commercial art and
architecture, preparing them to either enter those fields immediately
upon graduation or following the completion of college studies.

This school, with a student population mostly poor and working class,
and nearly 50% of Hispanic origin, has taken inordinate "hits" in terms
of budget and infrastructure during the last ten years, a period during
which all art related studies were viewed as "frills" and of little
consequence to the "bottom line".

FAD is made up of neighborhood residents, and a few parents of students
at the school, working to overcome a decade of neglect and pick the
place up by its bootstraps.

Several faculty members have volunteered to help teach interested kids
how to play music (art is not the only talent easily found at this
school) but no instruments are available for them to practice with amd
the school has been unable to shake any money free from the Board of
Education to provide them.

We are asking anyone who has a source for any sort of musical
instrument, especially woodwinds, flutes, etc (you can share a guitar or
drums; its not a good idea to share a flute) to contact us. We can
arrange for pickups nearly anywhere in the New York City region and,
through the auspices of several other groups working with us, we might
even be able to arrange shipping from anywhere in the U.S.A.

Naturally, any gifts to FAD would be fully tax-deductible AND would be
directly helping a kid who might be the next Gene Krupa or Andres
Segovia or Gloria Estevan somewhere down the road, if given half a
chance.

These kids don't want charity, they just want a chance.

Michael P. Higgins
Vice President
Friends of Art & Design
Manhattan
--
The old man was walking on the beach, where many starfish had washed
ashore.
He saw a little boy on the shoreline, throwing them back into the ocean.
The boy said 'They'll die if I don't get them back into the water.'
The man said 'Son, there are hundreds of starfish ashore. It's not going
to
make a difference.' The boy picked up a starfish and threw it into the
water.
He turned to the man and said, 'It made a difference to that starfish.'