Shannon Stem

As a young child, I absolutely loved school, but what I remember and look back on with the fondest of memories are the times that I spent in the music room with my music teacher, Mrs. Thompson. These memories, my own personal experiences, have helped shape my music education philosophy. I believe that every student should receive a quality music education. They should receive instruction in music spanning multiple cultures and genres, and should be afforded the ability to express themselves through singing, movement, and instrument playing. While this does not cover every aspect of elementary music education, imagine a world where this was occurring in every elementary school in our great state! My vision for the Florida Elementary Music Educators Association is very similar to my education philosophy. The experiences that I had shaped that vision, and I would love to see more teachers and students involved in the Regional and State level experiences available to our student populations. These events are the springboard of advocacy for elementary music education and through that advocacy I would love to see the schools who do not have music programs in them or do not have strong support for the music programs in them to be able to thrive musically. This also requires networking with other music teachers and supervisors, which is one incredible benefit of our elementary component organization. While there have been great opportunities for networking and collaboration with our organization in the past, I am so excited about the direction in which our organization is headed in supporting student and member engagement and I feel like this is an incredible step toward every student in our elementary schools receiving a quality music education. When it comes to music education, many times we as educators are the “lone wolf” on our campus. We are the content experts, but we are not often on a team of music content experts. I would love to see the member engagement portion of our elementary component organization create and build authentic connections between teachers so that while we are apart, we are still able to collaborate and deepen the level of engagement for our students. The mission of the Florida Elementary Music Educators Association is to unite and support music educators in order to provide a high quality, comprehensive music education for all children. I feel that if there is something we as an executive board can do to help that mission and vision become a reality, I would love to be a part of working to make that happen. It would be an honor to serve the music educators in this state once more, to further the cause of comprehensive elementary music education for all.