CMF Newsletter

May 2014

 

More Schools Add

First Note

Ariel Community Academy is the latest school to add First Note to their curriculum. This school is unique in a number of ways. In 1989, John W. Rogers, Jr. chairman and founder of Ariel Investments, created the Ariel Foundation. In 1991, the Ariel Foundation "adopted" forty sixth grade students at William Shakespeare Elementary on the south side of Chicago and promised to make college affordable for every student who graduated from high school.

 

 

Through these efforts, the Foundation attempted to create a program that could serve as a model for serving inner city youth involving academic enrichment, mentoring, family support, leadership development and community service opportunities.

  

Investment Curriculum
 
In addition to the mandated Chicago public school curriculum, Ariel Community Academy (ACA) has incorporated concepts of investing and financial literacy into the classroom. Through a partnership with Nuveen Investments, a Chicago-based investment and trust company, the Ariel-Nuveen Investment Program awards each incoming first grade class a $20,000 grant. This money is designated to the class as a whole and follows the students until their graduation (read more).

   

Thank You Matching Gift Partners!

 

CMF is fortunate to have so many generous donors providing the gifts that enable us to provide First Note to many of our under-resourced schools. What makes their gifts go even further are those employers that match their donations.  CMF would like to thank and acknowledge those companies that have provided matching funds to us this past year!

 

 

Children's Music Foundation, Inc.

608 State Street S., Suite 100
Kirkland, Washington 98033
www.cmfinc.org
425-250-2390

Thank You Anne Green Gilbert

 

Each First Note lesson begins with a series of exercises and movements called the "Frankie Dance" which was designed by Anne Green Gilbert (pictured right and below teaching her students). It is one of the kids favorite parts  of the program. She passionately believes that "A fully functioning body creates a fully functioning brain," and we at CMF believe this as well.  

 

Anne is the founder of Seattle's Creative Dance Center and director of Kaleidoscope Dance Company, a dance troupe for children.  She is retiring after 33 years (see Seattle Times story). Even at 66, Gilbert has such a high-energy, youthful personality that some people may be surprised to hear she's retiring after directing one last Kaleidoscope concert last weekend. She'll be succeeded by former Pacific Northwest Ballet dancer Terry Goetz, who will take the helm at the Creative Dance Center, while choreographer Anna Mansbridge, director of Seattle Early Dance, will become director of Kaleidoscope.

 

 

With the founding of the Creative Dance Center and Kaleidoscope in 1981, headquartered in North Seattle, she created a living laboratory where she tried out her ideas about dance, movement and body development. One result was "BrainDance," a warm-up exercise regimen that provided the building blocks for Kaleidoscope's style, but also had non-dance applications.

 

BrainDance, Gilbert says, was based on developmental patterns of movement in babies. It was especially influenced by Irmgard Bartenieff, a physical therapist who used babies' learning patterns to help people with polio to walk again.

   

 First Note wins Award

  

The Children's Music Foundation has been selected as one of the winners of this years Communicator Award. The Communicator Awards is the leading international awards program recognizing big ideas in marketing and communications.
 
The Communicator Awards honors work that transcends innovation and craft-work that made a lasting impact, providing an equal chance of winning to all entrants regardless of company or agency size and project budget.
 
 The Communicator Awards is sanctioned and judged by the Academy of Interactive & Visual Arts, an invitation-only group consisting of top-tier professionals from acclaimed media, communications, advertising, creative and marketing firms.  
 
 
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If you would like more information about how you can offer First Note in your school, please email us at info@cmfinc.org or call 425.250.2390.