A student from Glenville High School put this question to Cleveland Schools CEO Eric Gordon during last week’s Talk with the CEO livestream: “Can Glenville get new drums for a marching band by next football season?”
Glenville’s football team made school district history this year by winning the state championship. A cheerleading squad supports the team, but they don’t have a marching band. Not even a drumline.
For the state championship game, Warrensville Heights High School, a rival of Glenville High School, sent their marching band to perform.
Gordon said the district has been “investing aggressively in the arts, physical education and music” over the past two years. He pledged to take the student’s request to the district’s director of the arts, Jeffery Allen, so that resources to start a drumline will be available to Glenville students in the fall.
John Marshall High School, home to the district’s only high school marching band, built its band program from a drumline, Gordon said. He hopes that Glenville can do the same if student interest is there.
This week, during Cleveland City Council budget hearings, council members hit the same note, lamenting the general absence of music programs in Cleveland schools.
“A majority of our high schools don’t have music programs anymore,” said Council Member Michael Polensek, whose Ward 8 includes portions of Glenville and Collinwood. “And that’s why numerous students from Glenville and Collinwood communities are going to Shaw High School [in East Cleveland] for their music program. And that to me is an absurdity.”
During the hearings, council members urged officials to add music programs to the city’s recreation centers.
City officials confirmed that music lessons are being taught at two city rec centers: Cudell on the West Side and EJ Kovacic on the East Side. They also added that lessons are offered at Studio 105, an arts center run by the non-profit Center for Arts-Inspired Learning.