Throughout the last year, students from Morley Community School have been the fortunate recipients of first-rate musical opportunities, thanks to Legacy Children's Foundation's Gift of Music program.
Situated on the foothills of the Rocky Mountains, Morley reserve is home to the Stoney Nakoda First Nations. It is an area filled with warm people, rich cultural traditions, and beautiful landscapes. However, the Stoney Nakoda First Nations also face unique challenges, and often children and youth are most susceptible to distressing influences such as addiction, gang involvement, violence and suicide. Despite these circumstances, the Stoney Education Authority receive 30% less funding than provincially-funded school boards. It is for these reasons that the Legacy Children's Foundation Gift of Music program is such a welcome and necessary fixture at Morley Community School.
It is refreshing to hear the crisp guitar licks and muffled instructions echoing throughout the busy hallways on a Tuesday afternoon. The program indeed has a pleasant effect on the school's ambience, and has produced very real and positive outcomes for the students participating.
Guitar teacher Verne Luchinski has been coming to Morley to teach guitar since July 2009. He has been teaching 8 students individually for half-hour lessons, and has also been co-facilitating an after-school band program.
"I enjoy coming out here," he says. "I think I've developed friendships with all of [the students], which is very important to me. And I think that musically I've seen them progress - they all progress at different speeds - but they've been progressing."
When asked about any stand-out students, Luchinski is quick to point out 14-year old Tashina Ear.
"Tashina is great.'," Luchinski says. "She's a very quiet girl to begin with, but I never saw her smile until November or December. She started smiling, started to open up, crack the door a little bit, and she started telling me things. She's just developed a real keen interest in learning certain songs now and she's brought her friends alongside her as she's growing. You can see her confidence build as she shows her friends who haven't played guitar before how to play guitar. Very cool. She's come to her lessons pretty much all the time, so that's pretty good to see. I've had her the longest out of all the students because she started in the summer, so I've seen this over time - the confidence building and the friendship developing. She's started to become a good little player, learning on her own."
When asked about Luchinski, Ear doesn't hesitate to praise her teacher. "He's fun," she says. "He explains it well, so that's why I'm interested in it."
The effects of the Gift of Music program can also be seen through the improvement of students' academic performance; teachers have reported an improvement in attendance in some students since they began lessons. Ear confirms this. "I come to school more often now," she confesses. "Thank you for coming here and teaching me."
Irfan Pirbhai
Stoney Education Authority
Situated on the foothills of the Rocky Mountains, Morley reserve is home to the Stoney Nakoda First Nations. It is an area filled with warm people, rich cultural traditions, and beautiful landscapes. However, the Stoney Nakoda First Nations also face unique challenges, and often children and youth are most susceptible to distressing influences such as addiction, gang involvement, violence and suicide. Despite these circumstances, the Stoney Education Authority receive 30% less funding than provincially-funded school boards. It is for these reasons that the Legacy Children's Foundation Gift of Music program is such a welcome and necessary fixture at Morley Community School.
It is refreshing to hear the crisp guitar licks and muffled instructions echoing throughout the busy hallways on a Tuesday afternoon. The program indeed has a pleasant effect on the school's ambience, and has produced very real and positive outcomes for the students participating.
Guitar teacher Verne Luchinski has been coming to Morley to teach guitar since July 2009. He has been teaching 8 students individually for half-hour lessons, and has also been co-facilitating an after-school band program.
"I enjoy coming out here," he says. "I think I've developed friendships with all of [the students], which is very important to me. And I think that musically I've seen them progress - they all progress at different speeds - but they've been progressing."
When asked about any stand-out students, Luchinski is quick to point out 14-year old Tashina Ear.
"Tashina is great.'," Luchinski says. "She's a very quiet girl to begin with, but I never saw her smile until November or December. She started smiling, started to open up, crack the door a little bit, and she started telling me things. She's just developed a real keen interest in learning certain songs now and she's brought her friends alongside her as she's growing. You can see her confidence build as she shows her friends who haven't played guitar before how to play guitar. Very cool. She's come to her lessons pretty much all the time, so that's pretty good to see. I've had her the longest out of all the students because she started in the summer, so I've seen this over time - the confidence building and the friendship developing. She's started to become a good little player, learning on her own."
When asked about Luchinski, Ear doesn't hesitate to praise her teacher. "He's fun," she says. "He explains it well, so that's why I'm interested in it."
The effects of the Gift of Music program can also be seen through the improvement of students' academic performance; teachers have reported an improvement in attendance in some students since they began lessons. Ear confirms this. "I come to school more often now," she confesses. "Thank you for coming here and teaching me."
Irfan Pirbhai
Stoney Education Authority
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