Good news and work ahead

[Julie Majovsky]

Hello all,

I wish we were still in the springtime weather.  I hope everyone is keeping warm and thinking of marching band camp weather.  :)

First I wanted to give a shout out to our LPBA Secretary, Liz Sheffer, who has rocked our past couple of fundraisers.  Thank you Liz for all the work you did most especially for the one last night at Little Red Ribbon.  Thank you to everyone who stopped by or promoted it to family and friends.  We are grateful for your support.

Second, I wanted to give you all an update of something we discussed at our last meeting but has since been reversed.  As many of you may have heard, LP Administration had informed Mr. Lehman and Dr. Baker, the Choir director, last week of a decision to not offer an AP Music Theory class and combining one of the choirs for next year.  They said it was due to low enrollment in the classes.  

During our board meeting we discussed this decision with our school board liaison, Mr. Hollatz and Mr. Lehman to voice our concerns about this.  We all quickly realized that it was necessary to rally the community, look at the history of how these classes benefited our students and look toward the future.  This week, we have all been working together to gather our data to head to the board meeting on Monday.  

However, I AM THRILLED TO SAY that thanks to the voice of the community, staff, board members who know the value of Fine Arts AND Administration, the Lake Park Administration has made the decision today to REVERSE their initial decision and to offer those classes next year.  Well done everyone!  

Please note though, our jobs have just begun.  COVID has hit music very hard especially at the middle school and elementary school levels.  The board has already been discussing resurrecting and improving our recruitment.  Now is more important than ever as we do not want cuts to come down the pipeline next year.  We are holding a meeting on Tuesday at LP West at 7pm to discuss how to begin recruiting at the younger levels.  We are looking for parental help first and then we will include the high school students willing to help recruit.  Our goal is to have a team for each feeder school: Peacock, Roselle Middle, Westfield, Medinah, Springwood and Private schools.  Please come if you are interested in helping.  We will discuss recruitment of not only band but guard as well.  If you cannot come but would be interested in helping out, please let me know.

Again, thank you and let us get to work helping kids realize the value of music and programs such as ours.  We all know how much our kids have benefited.  We have to look toward our future as well.

And thank you again to those who helped spread the word, got involved or were willing to go on Monday.  Lake Park has heard from this community loud and clear.  We are only stronger when we work together.  

Peace,

Julie Majovsky

LPBA President

If you are kind, people may accuse you of ulterior motives.  Be kind anyway.  

Saint Mother Theresa