Happy Flag Day Everyone! This post will be a bit brief because as soon as I write this I will leave to go downtown. The Grand Finale of The National Anthem Project is in Washington DC. on the Washington Monument grounds this afternoon. The day started with about 1,000 music students at Fed Ex Field in Landover, Maryland, creating a giant map of the United States with words O, Say Can You See in the middle. Just before I left home I saw the kids on my local ABC-affiliate television station. Breaking news permitting, Good Morning America was expected to carry reports this morning, too.
The big finale this afternoon will be at the monument, though with a concert featuring "The President's Own" United States Marine Corps Band, the Oak Ridge Boys and more than 5,000 student musicians and music educators from all over the United States. We also have some elected officials, MENC leadership and other dignitaries coming. I am very excited to be going and taking pictures. I will have a two page spread of photos and information from the finale today, tomorrow at monuments around D.C. and Saturday at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, that I will include in the August issue of Teaching Music.
My week has been nuts, but fun and I wrapped up interviews, wrote stories and laid out the news pages for August and pages, except for the National Anthem Project stuff are out in the
building for people to read. I went downtown to a hotel in DC on Monday to interview MENC member Andrea Peterson, the National Teacher of the Year who is a music teacher from Granite Falls, Washington. She is so great, high energy, focused, but also funny. I can see why the kids, parents and other teachers in her district like her so much. Look for a story about her in the August TM, along with a great photo BS took.Well, gotta go. Hope Flag Day goes well for you, wherever you are. Music Education Rocks!
More later.
RF
Just a brief addendum to yesterday's Grand Finale. The day was fabulous. I met and interviewed so many wonderful music educators, not to mention students and parents who were thrilled to be here and be a part of the celebration. It was a day that made me proud to work for MENC.
Seeing a sea of red National Anthem T-shirts against the backdrop of the Washington Monument was breathtaking.
Look for lots of coverage in the online news soon at and in the August Teaching Music news, which is scheduled to go into the mail in mid-July.
Toodles again,
RF
