Taking a Personal, Professional, and Political Stand in an Elementary Music Education Praxis

• In Event: Saturday Roundtable Session 1:15 pm
  In Roundtable Session: Self-Studies Across Disciplines (Table 32)

Abstract

This self-study emerges as I reflect on my music education career, shifting from a rural music teacher to a university music educator at a Canadian University. Using stories of experience related to my move from a city to a rural context, and interactions politically, socially, and spatially with rural colleagues, parents, school board, and community in precarious points in my teaching career, I critically reflect on experiences that allow me to interrogate and evaluate my changing identity. As I now teach preservice educators, I understand the importance of advocating for the Arts, yet continue to learn to negotiate the fine lines between rural education values, advocacy, and politics that have greatly impacted my previous elementary and present career of university teaching.

Author

• Janet Spring, Lakehead University