Orchestra Director and Performing Arts Department Chair Annie Ray launched the Crescendo Orchestra for students with significant and severe disabilities at Annandale High School in Virginia. The seeds of the orchestra started in 2017, when twin brothers with significant disabilities were in her general elementary strings class that met once a week for 30 minutes. She struck up a friendship and collaboration with their mother and began modifying materials.
Ray started her job at Annandale High when COVID hit and was splitting her time between the high school and elementary school. Special education students came back to school first, and she invited them to her classroom to make music. “Alongside their special education teachers, paraprofessionals, occupational therapists and instructional assistants, we spent an entire year breaking down traditional string education until we had a fully written-out curriculum. We’ve been able to run it as a dedicated course since then,” she says proudly.
“Our approach is framed around students with disabilities having the right to truly learn how to play a musical instrument, and not just be socially included,” Ray explains. “The students perform at every concert, just like their general education peers.”
Like Ray, other educators have developed their own programs for working with students with disabilities, while others work with organizations like United Sound and Giving Bach. “I encourage all programs to look into prioritizing inclusion either on their own or with these organizations, which are a fantastic resource,” Ray says.
Outreach to parents is another concept that Ray has embraced. In 2018, she co-founded the Fairfax Arts Coalition for Education Parent Orchestra to provide parents and caregivers with some understanding of what happens in the music classrooms. The idea of a parent orchestra came from Ray’s mentor Brian Coatney, the Director of Orchestras at Wylie High School in Texas. “The Fairfax Parent Orchestra started with about 30 caregivers and have grown to 225 participants with four levels of ensembles — from adults who have never touched a musical instrument to those revisiting a forgotten-about violin in the back of their closet,” Ray says with a smile. “We meet twice a month and have been fortunate to perform at the Midwest Band and Orchestra Clinic!”
Parents can see what is actually happening between the notes and rhythms on the page and the resultant increase in parent involvement in the booster organizations is beneficial. However, Ray explains that there is so much more that comes from educating parents on the process their students go through as a new musician. The Parent Orchestra is an advocacy and educational tool used by parents and administrators. It’s also an experiential professional development opportunity and an mentorship avenue. Most of all, it bridges divides, Rey says.
Connecting is the underlying theme for Ray’s approach to teaching. “I am honored to teach at a school where students come from 66 different countries, speak 59 different languages, and our programs are made up of a vibrant mix of backgrounds, perspectives and strengths,” she exclaims. “For 81% of our students, a language other than English is spoken at home, and over 70% fall below the poverty line. In a world where that diversity can sometimes lead to conflict, investing in the whole student and meeting every student where they are at has been our foundation for understanding, community and progress.”
Ray considers herself lucky to have taught at the elementary, middle and high school levels in this community. “I am fortunate to have had my entire perspective shift on ‘why music education matters’ because of what they taught me,” she says. “To have grown alongside these students and watch them learn to take ownership of this program is one of the greatest gifts of my life.”
