As a volatile educative space, musical education must be interwoven with other concerns and other more encompassing constructs if it is to build robust, meaningful, and complex learning outcomes. This paper attempts to do this by placing music education and a complex understanding of policy side by side, and outlining what people can learn from…

Music learning among adults is witnessing rapid escalation as an important area of research and practice among music education professionals. In contrast to the years encompassed by childhood and adolescence, a significant challenge in teaching adults is that average life expectancies in developed countries include some 55 to 65 years beyond age…

Higher education is the linchpin of music education in North America. It is primarily in collegiate institutions that music teachers are educated throughout the life cycles of their careers. This begins with preservice programs, typically at the baccalaureate level, and continues with in-service professional development and graduate degree…

This paper aims to introduce a critical reflection on the field of music education in higher education, using the Bologna Declaration and the European context as a backdrop. However, the author would like to clarify that she does not intend to develop a thorough comparative analysis of music education in European countries. In fact, this is being…

In this paper, the author shares his thoughts regarding the future role of popular music in music education at a moment when there seems to be greater receptiveness to this idea than ever before. What is the reason for this increased receptiveness? It may be that music educators have sensed that a new playing field has evolved. There is now some…

It is the goal and the purpose on which the utopia is based that merit attention. As such, in this paper, the author engages in what Gilroy (in Shelby & Gilroy, 2008) referred to as a "utopian exercise" in order to think through one's "romance with" music as "part of the core curriculum" and as "balanced, comprehensive, and sequential". She…

This chapter takes into account and discusses innovative learning in the 21st digital and communicative century based on life-world-phenomenology and Hannah Arendt's view of democracy. From this point of view, the authors address and discuss how democratic practices can offer innovative musical learning in relation to what is taking place in…

There is no doubt that mediation has become a central issue outside formal music education. An outstanding example of this is digital music and its dependence on the new technologies of production, dissemination, and consuming. In this paper, the author argues that (1) mediation is one of the most important aspects of digital artistry and that (2)…

Change growing from technological innovation occasions both excitement and apprehension for all educators. This is especially so in music education. For music educators, as many new wants as new worries accompany these changes. In this article, the author argues for the critical engagement of the music education profession to amplify positive…

In this chapter, the authors develop a theory to explain the effects of mentoring and induction activities on new teachers' commitment, instructional quality, and effectiveness, and they describe how utility functions can express variation in these outcomes. Then they explicate the role of three-level models (i.e., with random effects) in…

Beginning mathematics teachers at the secondary level (middle and high school grades) have mathematics-specific needs that induction programs should address more substantially. However, a number of issues in how programs can accomplish this are more complex than often framed in discussions occurring in the induction programs and the field of…

The task of preparing and supporting new teachers for working with diverse youth has generated widespread interest in induction and mentoring programs (Wang & Odell, 2002). However, much of mentoring in practice falls short of equity- and diversity-focused work. It can be better characterized as "situational adjustment, technical advice, and…

Districts nationwide are implementing teacher induction programs as a strategy to increase both beginning teacher retention and student achievement. The induction of beginning teachers has been widely acknowledged as important for teachers' feelings of success and their retention (Darling-Hammond, 1994; Huling-Austin, 1989; Smylie, 1994).…

The work of mentoring matters. Whether one is looking at the broad-scale enactment of induction programming or the individualized attention focused on new teachers' learning and development, mentors play a pivotal role in new teacher retention and development. As a result, mentors are in a good position to interpret and enact induction policy at…

In this chapter, the authors draw on their experiences with working in building virtual communities of teachers and a pilot program to examine the prospects for increasing consistency in the effectiveness of new teacher support through online networks. Although not intended as a substitute for high-quality face-to-face mentoring experiences,…