West Creek Academy: music, language and culture update

Music is the centerpiece of the curriculum at West Creek Academy, and details on the program have firmed up in the past few days.

As we reported in Februrary, music is a required subject at the shiny new school, and students can choose from violin, piano, cello or voice (the latter two are offered in the upper grades).

The recent West Creek Academy newsletter spells out more details: the program will be administered by Dr. Susan Allen, Associate Dean of Music at Cal Arts.  The lessons will be taught by Cal Arts graduate students, and there is talk of a future connection with the LA Philharmonic.  Dr. Allen is an accomplished harpist with an impressive list of credentials and experience.  Her website has all the details, including this tidbit:

David Cotner of the Los Angeles Weekly wrote, “CalArts dean and persistent purveyor of the nude piano that is the harp, Susie Allen has spread the gospel of new music across the world, from The Today Show to National Public Radio, Carnegie Hall and Gaudeamus Contemporary Music Week in the Netherlands. She’s lectured internationally on music in general and has recorded for Brian Eno’s Opal label. A snappy studio savant as well as an intuitive improviser and an initiate on the kayagum, she moves birdsong moments through trilling vibrations – inverse, obverse and beautiful.”

The kayagum is a Korean string instrument that looks and sounds this:

So… how is the Korean language instruction going?  Our son comes home each week with a couple of new words that he has learned from his peers (he managed to impress our favorite berry farmer at last week’s Farmer’s Market with a Korean greeting, the names of a few fruits and a goodbye — the eastern equivalent of Dora the Explorer’s success with his Spanish). Principal Pak has implemented a closed circuit TV system that is intended to replace the peer instruction within the coming weeks.

You might also recall that students of the now-defunct Bouquet Canyon Elementary were given guaranteed admission to West Creek Academy.  Bouquet’s leftover PTA funds were used to fund the new West Creek PTA, and the PTA Board is largely made up of Bouquet Canyon veterans.  A recent PTA meeting revealed two political ‘power vectors’ at the school: Bouquet parents and Korean parents, both jockeying for position and favor with Mr. Pak.  The PTA meeting went something like this: Bouquet Canyon parents held court on the stage of the multi-purpose room, while about a half-dozen Korean-speaking moms held sidebar conversations with Mr. Pak during the meeting.  Pure pwnage.

Aside from some politics and a few wrinkles in the startup, we’re thrilled to be a part of WCA.

I’m impressed with Mr. Pak’s approach of leveraging available resources to enhance the classroom experience.  Some examples:

• Integrating Cal Arts – the gem in our own backyard – to handle music cirriculum
• Having kids lead some of the foreign language instruction
• The use of Google Sites as a collaboration tool for parents (Google provides its services to public education for free)
• Taking advantage of simple streaming technology to broadcast special events into the classroom — like this week’s award ceremonies.

We feel our son is getting a top notch education, daily exposure to innovative approaches with the added bonus of being a part of a diverse student body.