The Value of Musical Education: Perspectives from Students and Policy from Institutions

• In Event: AERA Research in Progress Roundtable Session Four
  In Invited Roundtable: Research-in-Progress RT055 (Saturday)

Abstract

As full-time jobs in the music industry become increasingly scarce, music graduates are often faced with a gig-economy and precarious work. While institutions of higher education are gradually introducing new curricula to support students in this new labor reality, new materials often center a neoliberal ideology which affects the labor of students and demands on their time. In this paper, I employ a multiple case study analysis of undergraduate students at two different music institutions to better understand how these students understand the role and purpose of their labor both within and after their undergraduate experience. I place this in conversation with a critical policy analysis of the stated goals and values of these institutions to identify value discrepancies.

Author

• Sophie Ailsa Lewis, Boston University