Amazon Sends 50 Musical Instruments to Rainier Beach High

More to come but from SPS:


Responding to a student-led campaign to ask the Seattle community for donated instruments to support the Rainier Beach High School (RBHS) Music Program, E-commerce company, Amazon, will deliver more than 50 new instruments to RBHS.

Amazon is a proud to support RBHS and this donation will provide young musicians the opportunity to follow their passions. They are also dedicated to supporting the needs of the Seattle community. Seattle Public Schools (SPS) is proud to team-up with Amazon to provide the best educational experience for students across the district.

Comments

Greg said…
Wow! That's great!
3/21/17, 4:44 PM
GarfieldMom said…
Kudos to the students who campaigned for this, and thanks to Amazon for supporting the arts at Rainier Beach!
3/21/17, 5:49 PM
Anonymous said…
And thanks to the Amazon employees who tipped off the company PR team about the opportunity! More of this, please. They could afford to fill the libraries at every title I school in WA, and they built their business on books...more of this, please!

Fix AL
3/21/17, 7:19 PM
Anonymous said…
Still shocking that such a rich city can't afford to fund a basic high school music program...all this money goes into Central Office programs to try to figure out why the "gap" exists when it could/should be going straight to the schools to fund basic arts programs.

-NW mom
3/22/17, 9:01 AM
Melissa Westbrook said…
I am astonished that the district has not tweeted about this nor has an announcement at the website. They knew this was coming and this is how they treat such a great gift?

They did finally tweet about the Paul Allen Foundation gift.
3/22/17, 9:53 AM
Anonymous said…
Honestly, after what I know about instruments - this is great, but they need a fund to do the annual professional required maintenance or within a year or two, no matter what the kids and teachers do, they'll be whacked. Brass gets totally disassembled and chem dipped, felt pads replaced, etc - that can't be done by the kids. Strings have to get their bridges tightened/glued back in place. Pegs break or need to be replaced - every summer I see entire sets of school instruments lined up at the repair facility at Ted Brown Music. I get my own kid's trumpet done twice a year.

The money to maintain these instruments so they're actually playable over time - where's that coming from?

SPS has a crappy track record on maintenance. On everything. And it costs more then.

I hope Amazon has some interested people who will set up a way to help keep these instruments in good condition, not just a "donate and forget."

-- Math Counts
3/22/17, 6:32 PM
Anonymous said…
Excellent point Math Counts. Maintenance isn't sexy but it is essential. Still kudos to Amazon for providing what the students asked for (rather than telling them what they need like the Gates Foundation).

-Music Wonk
3/22/17, 8:51 PM
SusanH said…
Math Counts:

You get your child's trumpet serviced twice a year? Maybe that's why my daughter sounds so dreadful! Ha ha. She's gone her whole middle school career on an unserviced trumpet! :)

Agree about maintenance though. And reeds!! Reeds are expensive.

But yay for Amazon. Since they are making mountains of money and fundamentally changing the landscape of Seattle (geography, demographics, cost of housing, traffic), it's nice to hear about them giving back to the community.
3/23/17, 10:46 AM
Unknown said…
Re: maintenance/repair... recently became aware of this organization which is working to address this need:

rawkbox.org

Rawkbox is a volunteer run Seattle, Washington based nonprofit (501c3) offering new, used, repaired, recycled, or up-cycled guitars and guitar related gear exclusively to music education nonprofits at low or no cost.

The "rawk" in Rawkbox is aiding music organizations in maintaining, repairing, and recycling instruments for student use. We focus on instruments so they can focus on education.

The "box" in Rawkbox is our mobile repair vehicle. A repair shop on wheels enabling us to go onsite and setup, repair, refurbish, or recycle the gear used in schools, camps, and other music education focused organizations and events (think food truck style vehicle).

- Adam Z
3/23/17, 1:19 PM
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