it at two different schools and expanded it to include more schools in the upcoming years . The following school year should continue this trend .
Key to Success # 1 : Join Together with the Right Schools and Teachers
We tried to include schools that were geographically close so that no one would have to leave school before the official start of the school day and everyone would be home before the busses ran for their afternoon run . This is difficult in “ The County ”! Our schools are Ashland District School and Mapleton Elementary School , which are 13 miles apart . The fifth grade population in each school is approximately 25 and we each have about 20 students in our fifth grade band program . That gave us our first 40 students . Mapleton is part of MSAD # 1 so it made sense to include the rest of the MSAD # 1 students . They gave us another approximately 40 band students . This number of students would have been okay , but we knew that we needed more teachers to help with the different instrument groups so we looked to our neighbors . We already had a connection with the music instructors at Washburn District School and Limestone School so we reached out to them to see if they were interested in participating . Fortunately , they were . Our total pre-registration student count was 98 : 18 flutes , 17 clarinets , 14 saxophones , 20 trumpets , 1 , French horn , 8 trombones , and 20 percussionists . This gave us a group that was somewhat balanced .
Key to Success # 2 : We Believe That Students Have the Desire to Perform
The ultimate goal of the day was to have students “ share their learning ” or in other words perform as instrument sections and with a large , mixed group . This required what we called Master Teachers , one for each instrument . In most cases we used the teachers from the sending schools . From Ashland , Jonathan Simonoff taught trombone . Washburn teachers , Teresa Herold and Sean Diette taught flute and saxophone respectively . Jenna Simonoff , the Limestone teacher taught clarinet and Dan Schneider from MSAD # 1 was the percussion coach . Finally , we recruited Paul LaPointe , from Houlton , out of retirement to work with our trumpets . Our french horn player went with the trumpets .
There are two more positions that had to be filled in order to have the day run smoothly . The first was a musical position . We needed someone to direct the band . This was a key position and required someone who was succinct and efficient in his band rehearsal methods . For this position we recruited Larry Hall , retired music educator from Ashland . He was the perfect fit of intensity with humor and provided our students with a solid rehearsal and performing experience . The final position was a person to keep