Committee focused on raising $35K for second semester
program
On a Monday morning, Erinn Barca-Hall’s middle school band
students practiced a song from
”
Music for a Darkened Theater.
”
The band’s notes could be heard from the office and the campus
courtyard. The students played such varied instruments as the
cymbals, the xylophone, the flute and more.
Most of Barca-Hall’s students have been playing instruments for
five to six years, and they come to her knowing how to read and
play music from their time in the Hollister School District’s
elementary school music program.
Committee focused on raising $35K for second semester program
On a Monday morning, Erinn Barca-Hall’s middle school band students practiced a song from “Music for a Darkened Theater.” The band’s notes could be heard from the office and the campus courtyard. The students played such varied instruments as the cymbals, the xylophone, the flute and more.
Most of Barca-Hall’s students have been playing instruments for five to six years, and they come to her knowing how to read and play music from their time in the Hollister School District’s elementary school music program.
The program was cut by the Hollister School Board last year, due to a dire financial situation in a district that also cut middle school sports. But shortly after the announcement of the cuts, a group of parents began organizing the Mr. O’s Save the Music Drive. The drive honors Joe Ostenson, the former band teacher who retired when Barca-Hall took over the Rancho San Justo and Marguerite Maze band.
The fundraising, which began last year, has collected $42,000. They had enough to keep the music program for the fall semester but they still need to raise $35,000 to fund the elementary band for the second semester.
Their ultimate goal is to collect $156,000 to cover the cost of the program for two years.
“Our largest concern with the district is that there is no lapse from one year to the next,” said Anthony Ortega, one of the parents involved in the drive. “We submitted a check for $34,000 in June that allowed us to have the program reinstated at the start of this year.”
The fundraisers have varied, including a pancake breakfast, an Italian dinner night, a raffle for a quilt and a play-a-thon where the middle school and elementary school students played music.
“We had people donate per song or a flat fee,” Barca-Hall said. “I got kids who got $20 per song and they played 30 songs. They played for eight hours.”
She said she learned that some of her students write their own songs, play the guitar and sing. The play-a-thon raised $6,500.
“It strengthened the relationship between middle school and elementary school,” she said. “We invited the elementary school students to play songs that day.”
Barca-Hall splits her time between teaching at the middle schools and teaching sixth-graders at the elementary schools since the grade was moved down from the middle school campuses to the elementary campuses.
“I’m able to move them up and advance them,” Barca-Hall said. “I can get them into some middle school concerts.”
Barca-Hall said the middle school programs do not offer beginning band so it is important that students have the elementary school program with teacher Susan Silveria before they get to seventh grade.
“If they started in seventh grade, they wouldn’t be able to do what they do,” she said. “It’s why our high school band is award-winning. They can do so much.”
She said that many of the students in her classes participate in marching band and jazz band after school or on weekends.
“This is all they do,” she said, adding that some of her students are also involved in San Benito Stage Company, choir, the Santa Cruz Symphony or Honor Band.
Barca-Hall said the students have a strong group of friends when they move on to the high school, including upperclassmen that can look out for them.
She said she has been to many of the fundraisers and has encouraged the band students to be involved as well. In addition to the Save the Music Drive, the students are doing band booster fundraisers to cover the cost of travel to competitions.
Barca-Hall said she is often handing out fliers about upcoming fundraisers.
“We were averaging three to four events a month,” Ortega said.
Current fundraisers include ticket sales for Fireworks at Seacliff Beach on Oct. 7, which volunteers have been selling at the Hollister Downtown Farmers Market on Wednesdays. A portion of the $10 ticket price goes to Save the Music. In October, the band students will also be selling Casa de Fruta fudge, with $5 from each pound sold going to Save the Music.
The next big event will be Nov. 5, when Save the Music Drive members are planning to organize an attempt to break the world record for most people doing Zumba at one time. Ortega said the event is tentatively scheduled to take place on the Rancho San Justo soccer field and people will be able to participate for any donation amount. Barca-Hall said that the Rancho-Maze Band craft faire is the same day, in the school gymnasium, so she is hoping people will stop by to attend both events.
Ortega got involved in the drive because he has two children in the program, one in middle school and one in elementary school.
“My youngest son is high-functioning autistic – he’s mainstream at R.O. Hardin,” Ortega said. “We are fortunate to have great teachers. Autism has a tendency to render victims socially inept at times. The confidence he is able to gain from being in band and being involved – he’s made improvements.”
He said his older son has learned to play three or four different instruments through the program.
“His personal competition as well as community events has really helped him in his academics as well,” Ortega said.
Two other families have been involved with Ortega from the start, including Steve Chase, who has a child in middle school band, and Tony and Cheryl Weir, who are active in the Baler Band Booster Club. They have a lot of other community members who have organized or helped with fundraisers. Ortega said the superintendent Gary McIntyre and the HSD board have been supportive of the efforts.
“The school district was in a position to take a vote that was disturbing to them as much as us,” he said. “The way they worked with us to continue to fund it as we go along has been a show of their personal interest in keeping it.”
Mr. O’s Save the Music Drive
For more on upcoming fundraisers for Mr. O’s Save the Music Drive, visit www.savehollistermusic.org. Donations can also be mailed to: Baler Band Boosters, ATTN: Save the Music, P.O. Box 373, Hollister, CA 95024 or made online with a credit card or PayPal account.
For more information, call Anthony Ortega at 801-1934 or e-mail
an************@eo*********.com
; Steve Chase at 277-0254 or e-mail
ss*******@gm***.com
; or Tony Weir at 408-439-6354 or
to*******@ya***.com
.
