Note: If you read this and wonder how in the world I can possibly stay employed, rest assured I often have the same question. On the other hand, while teaching doesn't pay that well I have the best "day job" there is. regardless of compensation. Period. I am very, VERY lucky. Ok. Here ya' go...
Year End Self Evaluation:
I am, generally, very pleased with this past year. I find it very difficult to discuss my own work objectively, but I do feel that things went well this year and I was grateful to learn that I am considered “above and beyond” in several of the evaluation rubric’s categories.
The truth is that I am always looking at how I can improve the CMAS experience for my students. On some levels it’s because I am not convinced that we are doing everything as well as we can, so I like to think that the program can continue to evolve as I look to further improve the implementation of the curriculum. However, if I am to be totally honest, a great deal of my interest in evolving the program is because I believe that there is no such thing as “status quo.” It’s either getting better or worse – there are no other options. To that end, staying the same is, to me at least, just a variation on getting worse. Plus, I get bored easily. Which I figure means my students do too so that has to be accounted for. I also believe very strongly that education is always evolving. It must, I would say, by definition. In fact, for all we have changed by creating CMAS I fully predict that some day there will be something that will come along and make CMAS seem as outmoded as many traditional programs do now. This is a completely different issue than what I am to be covering here, but it is important, I feel, in order to put my comments below in to full perspective. So…
As proud as I am of this past year, I am not at all convinced that I have found the correct balance between guiding the students in pursuit of their goals and allowing them the space to explore the possibilities of their musical instincts free from my influence. It is very easy to talk about “guided independent study,” but it is not so easy to implement with a content area that is as creative and subjective as it is technically and academically demanding.
To be fair, this year I feel I greatly improved the execution of the workshops we do at the end of each project cycle. I felt that this year was far more productive in allowing the students more effective feedback from both myself and their peers than in the past. But at some point this year, I began to notice that my original concerns, that date back many years, to the start of what would eventually become CMAS, that if I was too “hands on” in their process the students would simply create material that sounded less like themselves and too much like an extension of me. Something, I assure you, I would loath as I find that notion very, if I can be so cliché, unmusical.
But something new has come to light in the wake of the evolution of the way the curriculum is being implemented: In numerous, unsolicited conversations, with students across the entire spectrum of the CMAS program, they are apparently looking to me as more of a producer rather than just a teacher. I have always been hesitant to get too involved in their creative side, beyond giving them the necessary tools, but it appears that they are looking to me to guide them more directly. Not so much in the idea stage, but once they have the foundation of the material. It’s a huge complement that I am not certain they themselves fully appreciate, but it none-the-less creates an interesting opportunity to yet again change the paradigm a bit.
I have to admit that the notion of approaching CMAS more as a producer is very appealing – certainly to my ego – but I want to be very careful that it does not lead to a nonproductive (nonmusical – there’s that cliché again. Sorry.) arrogance. There is a sign when you first walk in to CMAS that says, “Arrogance is the enemy.” I put it there to remind myself as much as to remind the students. I have to take some time this summer to completely work out how to fully become an effective producer in the context of CMAS, and likely, like all things CMAS, it will be an evolutionary process; but it seems logical at this point to move forward and see what’s viable. If it turns out I am wrong (it would not be the first time) in this, then we can take another look at a later date.
I’ll close by stating that as I reread what I have written here, I am not entirely certain this is what was asked for as a year end self reflection, but as I think back on the last year, and all we accomplished in CMAS, this is the one thing that keeps coming to my mind as needing to be addressed for next year more than anything else in terms of my role in it all. Happy Sumer break!
