How Trump is reshaping Music Education

President’s Trumps’ gutting of the Kennedy Center may get headlines, but his broader war on DEI and the Department of Education could have far deeper long term consequences. Learn how Trump is reshaping music education.

How Trump is reshaping Music Education

Today’s US orchestras are 80% White, 11% Asian, 5% Hispanic and 2% Black. In an effort to change that Chicago non-profit Equity Arc connects talented student musicians of color with mentors and opportunities to learn.

Perhaps the most exciting for many of those students was an invitation from the United States Marine Band to come to Washington, DC to perform with them this Spring.

But after President Trump’s day-one executive orders “Ending Radical and Wasteful Government DEI Programs and Preferencing” the show was cancelled.

60 Minutes recently did a piece including the retired Marines who stepped in.

“I just felt like, well, there’s usually two responses to something. You can complain about it, or you could do something about it. I chose the latter within seconds. And it was the easiest decision ever,” John Abbracciamento, retired Marine Band trumpeter, said.

“I challenge anyone, literally anyone, to come to me and say by having this concert does damage to the United States,” he continued. “It doesn’t. It brings out the best of us.”

Gutting The Department Of Education

Trump’s was on diversity in music and music education extends far beyond a single band concert.

The US Department of Education is responsible for IDEA (disability education funding), Pell Grants (college funding for poor families), Title I (federal funding for grade school education), and student loans.

All have a direct of inderect impact

But Trump has also promised to gut and eventually close the entire US Department of Education – a major source funding and guidance for music education programs of all kinds. Already 40% to 50% of DoE staff are or will soon be let go.

In February a letter from the Department of Education to presidents of colleges and music schools, outlawed positive discrimination for students of under-represented backgrounds:

“The Department will no longer tolerate the overt and covert racial discrimination that has become widespread in this Nation’s educational institutions. The law is clear: treating students differently on the basis of race to achieve nebulous goals such as diversity, racial balancing, social justice, or equity is illegal under controlling Supreme Court precedent.”

In addition to DEI, Trump has also promised to gut and eventually close the entire US Department of Education – a major source funding and guidance for music education programs of all kinds. Already 40% to 50% of DoE staff are or will soon be let go.

Bruce Houghton is the Founder and Editor of Hypebot, a Senior Advisor at Bandsintown, a Berklee College Of Music professor and founder of the Skyline Artists Agency