VIDEO: PSD Superintendent Says Future of Middle School Band "Looking Positive," Parents Weigh Ideas

Last week, dozens of parents and students  to discuss how to save the 's music program, which could teach nearly 400 middle school-age students to play an instrument next year, while PSD staff scrambled to find a way to fund it for one more year. 

The program's started suddenly when the Rob Schneider Music Foundation (RSMF), which has provided most of the program's funding for the last 15 years, notified the district that it would no longer be able to deliver its annual check starting next year. 

The district's governing board instructed Superintendent Wendy Tukloff to review PSD's finances to see if it could keep the program afloat--essentially by paying two instructor's salaries and benefits totaling about $160,000--through next year.

Tukloff said today that, although she's still double-checking numbers, conditions look "positive".

"It’s looking good as far as I know right now," she said. "I want to make sure I'm looking a the numbers correctly. I'm hoping that things will go smoothly and we’ll be able to move forward for one more year."

A couple of things need to happen before the district can support its music program for another year. Contract negotiations with the local teachers union need to be finalized so the district can move forward with staffing and then it needs to see if it can squeeze in music instructors Thomas Stafford's and Jerry Downs's salaries and benefits for another year. 

Tukloff and staff will make a presentation to the PSD board on March. 2 outlining what plan, if any, the district hopes to execute to keep band around. New funding must be budgeted before Sept. 2011. 

The problem of how to replace RSMF's weighty support in the long run remains, however. That's what parents of Pacifica students and students themselves attempted to address at the meetings last week. 

They broke up into small groups at the meetings under the guidance of Stafford to brainstorm ideas on how the program might be preserved in the long run.

Among other ideas, they came up with instituting a moratorium on the district buying instruments (parents could rent them privately instead), starting a non-profit to make donations to the district tax deductable, approaching corporations about sponsorships, reducing staff hours, laying off one music instructor, telling the community of the benefits of music and how it impacts students' overall learning and performance, finding grants and soliciting work from volunteer grant writers and finding out how Capucchino High survived economic hard times and kept its music program. 

"Music is not an extra," said Alyssa Jenkins, a parent in attendance at Thursday night's meeting. "It's an academic pursuit with direct ties to math, science and verbal scores." 

Watch the VIDEO to the right for more ideas that parents and students came up with and to hear some of the complaints brought to PSD staff.