Centennial History - Presidents (1988-current)
Charles R. Hoffer (1988-90)
In addition to his term as MENC president, Charles R. Hoffer served as president of the Indiana Music Educators Association and president of the North Central Division of MENC. He served on the committees that wrote the National Standards in Music and the Sunshine State Standards for Florida. He has spoken or conducted clinics in almost every state, and was also active in the International Society for Music Education. Hoffer was also a member of the MENC Music Education Research Council and the Publications Planning Committee.
Hoffer taught 14 years in the public schools of Michigan, New York, and Missouri before joining the faculty of Indiana University at Bloomington in 1966. He moved to the University of Florida in 1984 and served as head of music education for many years. In addition, he taught summer sessions at Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore and twice at the University of Michigan.
Hoffer has authored about thirty-five books on music and music education, including Teaching Music in the Secondary Schools (five editions), Foundations of Music Education (with Abeles and Klotman, two editions), Music for Elementary Classroom Teachers, Introduction to Music Education (two editions), The Understanding of Music (six editions), and Music Listening Today (three editions). He also wrote a chapter for the first edition of the Handbook of Research on Music Teaching and Learning and authored many articles in professional journals, as well as contributing to several MENC publications.
"Today music education has achieved a scope and size that would astound Lowell Mason, were he, by some warp of time, to return and observe school music programs. As long as music educators retain Mason's vision and passion for music for all students, there is no reason why it cannot continue to grow and improve in the future."
"In fulfilling its constitutional duty, MENC should be the leader in advancing music education. Such activities should include promoting music with governmental agencies and in society, enlarging the scope of music education to encompass all people, offering various means for communicating ideas on teaching and curriculum, encouraging adequate professional preparation for music teachers, and developing joint efforts with other professional and arts organizations."
Music Educators Journal, Dec. 1981
Music Educators Hall of Fame 2006
Karl J. Glenn (1990-92)
Karl Glenn was born in Kansas City, Missouri. He attended the University of Missouri Columbia (B.S. in Ed., 1957) and The University of Michigan (M.M. Wind Instruments, 1959). After graduation, he married Elizabeth and the couple established residence in Washington, D.C. where he was a member of "The President's Own" United States Marine Corps Band playing French horn during the Eisenhower and Kennedy administrations. Glenn later taught at Otterbein College (Westerville, Ohio) and the University of Wisconsin-Platteville. He returned to the University of Michigan, receiving a Ph.D. in Music Education in l972. After graduation, he taught music and conducted the orchestra at Cass Technical High School (Detroit Public Schools) until retirement in l995. During his teaching, he was president of the Michigan Music Educators Association, the MENC North Central Division, and MENC. As MENC president, Glenn wrote articles and made appearances in the U.S. and abroad on behalf of music education and worked with the National Association of Music Merchants (NAMM) and the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences on a national campaign, "Music Makes the Difference," advocating music and the arts in the schools. Upon retirement, Glenn worked ten years as a volunteer in the Pastoral Care Department at the University of Michigan Hospitals and the Naples (Florida) Community Hospital specializing in acute-care for bone-marrow transplant and oncology patients.
"Music instruction in the United States has always been a call to realize our highest aspirations, both as an art and as a people. Music education in our country has been and is a profession consisting of improvers, uplifters, and raisers of the human spirit, especially for those who may be poor or otherwise disadvantaged. Given the history of music throughout the centuries in all parts of the world, and the fact that music forms much of the bedrock upon which the world's cultures exist, there is no reason to believe that people in the United States will suddenly drop their love of music or remove it from the education of their children. What is important here is that we find new opportunities for music education that exist within the larger contexts of social, economic, and political change. Our success depends upon the willingness to have an open mind, a keen sense of the importance of music in all cultures, and our ability to positively affect our nation, its citizens, and all others through the art of music."
[See Allen P. Britton (1914-2003, president MENC 1960“62), "Music Education: An American Specialty," Source Book III: Perspectives in Music Education, (Washington, D.C.: Music Educators National Conference, l956) 18, 26 and Karl J. Glenn, "The Mobilization of Music Education for the Global Economy," The Quarterly: Journal of Music Teaching and Learning, University of Northern Colorado, Summer, 1995, 5l, 52.]
Dorothy A. Straub (1992-94)
Dorothy Straub served as president of MENC and president of MENC's Eastern Division, chaired the MENC committee for string and orchestra education, and has co-authored a number of publications in the area of string education, such as TIPS: Establishing a String and Orchestra Program, published by MENC. Straub long served as Music Coordinator for the Fairfield public schools in Connecticut and as Orchestra Director at Fairfield High School. She was also a string and orchestra teacher in the West Port, Connecticut, public schools for eight years, and music coordinator for the West Port and Fairfield public schools. She is a graduate of Indiana University with bachelor's and master's degrees in Music Education, specializing in strings.
Straub has been the conductor of the concert orchestra of the Bridgeport Symphony Youth Orchestra, and has served as guest conductor for string festivals in numerous states. She also has been a violinist in the Greenwich Symphony and in greater Bridgeport symphony orchestras. She is a distinguished member of the American String Teachers Association (ASTA), and has been editor of the School Teachers Forum in ASTA's American String Teacher magazine. She also holds memberships in the National School Orchestra Association, the American Federation of Musicians, and the American Orff-Schulwerk Society.
During her presidency, Dorothy Straub distinguished herself through her positive influence on people by building coalitions and working closely and harmoniously with MENC staff. She exhibited excellence in teaching, a commitment to string and orchestra education, and a strong vision for the place of music education in the life of children.
"Nurturing and enabling the capacity for each child to experience the excitement of music is what we are all about."
Dorothy Straub, "The Gift of Giving: Holiday Reflections," Music Educators Journal 79, no. 4 (December 1992): 4.
"Our overriding agenda, however, is the survival of music and the other arts for our children's sake. The commonalities we share as music educators are far greater than the factors that separate us. In these commonalities we have great strength."
Dorothy Straub, "Synthesis," Music Educators Journal 79, no. 1 (September 1992): 4.
"The emerging standards are a part of real education reform. They will have an impact on current practitioners, textbooks authors and publishers, and teacher-training institutions, all of which will result in higher expectations and greater educational opportunity for all students in our nation's schools, from pre-kindergarten through grade 12."
Dorothy Straub, "The Impact of National Standards," Music Educators Journal, 79, no. 5 (January 1993): 51.
Lowell Mason Fellows 2003
Will Schmid (1994-96)
A native of Springfield, Minnesota, Will Schmid holds a B.A. from Luther College and a Ph.D. from the Eastman School of Music. His public school teaching included general music, choral music and band, and he taught at Winona State University and the University of Kansas. Will Schmid is former chair of the Music Department at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.
Schmid is the author of the best-selling Hal Leonard Guitar Method (in nine languages), and over fifty other books for guitar and banjo, cassettes, CDs, and videotapes for Hal Leonard Publishing. He is also the principal author/editor of an eight-volume high school choral textbook, Something New to Sing About, published by Glencoe/G. Schirmer. His most recent publications include a student text and teacher's guide entitled A Vision Shared: A Tribute to Woody Guthrie and Leadbelly published by MENC, and contributions as a program author to Silver Burdett Ginn's The Music Connection series. Schmid has also given workshops throughout the United States and in Australia, Canada, and Europe.
During his MENC Presidency, Schmid worked to reestablish the importance of active music making in schools and in America at large. As a result, MENC created new partnership initiatives in the areas of guitar, keyboard, strings, drumming, and singing, exemplified by the Get America Singing Again! campaign and the MENC/Gama Teaching Guitar scholarship workshops. After a two-year, $140,000 national pilot project, Schmid has published the World Music Drumming curriculum, which brings the excitement of African and Latin drumming and signing to middle school curriculum throughout the United States and Canada. Schmid has said that his interest in world drumming began with his Ph.D. dissertation at the Eastman School of Music. Prior to that, he was aware of the need to expand the study of music in American schools to include folk, popular, and world music, and he made it a priority in his career.
Lowell Mason Fellows 2002
Carolynn A. Lindeman (1996-98)
Carolynn A. Lindeman served as president of MENC, president of MENC's Western Division, and President of CMEA: The California Association for Music Education. She was a member of the MENC National Standards for Music Education Task Force, and has authored four college textbooks in the area of elementary music education, class piano, and music fundamentals as well as over fifty articles. She is the series editor for MENC's Strategies for Teaching books, a series of thirteen publications designed to help music educators implement the music standards.
Lindeman distinguished herself and amplified the mission of MENC through her careful nurturing of standards-based music education, articulated in such a way as to be accessible by music teachers. She has helped champion the cause of international music education and increased understanding among peoples through musical exchanges. In April 2001, Lindeman led the first delegation of music educators on a People to People Ambassador Program to Cuba. The recipient of five San Francisco State University Meritorious Performance and Professional Promise Awards, Lindeman was elected to CMEA's Hall of Fame in 2006; named a Lowell Mason Fellow and Oberlin College Conservatory of Music's Outstanding Music Education Alumna in 2004; and given the California Arts Council 2001 Outstanding Arts Educator Award, the CMEA Award for Extraordinary Service to Music Education in March 2000, and the California Band Directors Association Friends of Music Education Award in February 1999.
Lindeman is Professor of Music Emerita at San Francisco University. She is a graduate of Oberlin College (B.M.), San Francisco State University (M.A.), Stanford University (D.M.A.), and has studied at the Mozarteum Academy in Austria. Prior to college teaching, she taught and coordinated elementary classroom music programs in New York and California. She served on the Board of Directors for the International Society for Music Education (ISME) from 2000-2004 and the President's Committee on the Arts of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts from 2000-2002. She currently serves on the National Committee of Examiners in Music for Educational Testing Service, the Executive Committee of MENC's Music Education Research Council, the Editorial Board of the International Journal for Music Education, and chairs the International Society for Music Education's Advocacy Committee. Active as a speaker and clinician, she has given presentations throughout the United States, Canada and Europe, Southeast Asia, Mexico, South Africa, and Israel.
"One hundred years ago, sixty-nine music educators joined together in Keokuk, Iowa to form a professional association dedicated to bringing the best in music education to America's children. What an incredible professional organization they put into motion! MENC has grown to be the largest arts education organization in the world, earned an envious reputation as the premiere professional association for music educators, and remained faithful to its mission to bring quality music education to all. On this momentous occasion, let's not only celebrate our proud past, but rededicate ourselves to ensuring that the very best in music education reaches all of America's children."
Provided via E-mail communication, September 2006.
Lowell Mason Fellows 2003
June Hinckley (1998-2000)
As arts education specialist for the Florida Department of Education, June Hinckley led the development of the Sunshine State Standards for the Arts, which are based on the National Standards for Arts Education, and were adopted by the Florida State Board of Education in 1996. Hinckley assists schools and school districts with the implementation of the arts standards and connecting the arts with the state accountability and testing program, and serves as a liaison among the various K-12 arts education groups, higher education, and community arts organizations. She was a founding organizer of the Arts for a Complete Education project, which has coalesced the various community, industry, and school arts organizations in Florida to cooperatively and proactively work to improve the quality and quantity of arts programs throughout the state.
June Hinckley served as president of MENC, chair of the National Consortium for Arts Education Association, and represents all the arts on several national committees. She was a member of the writing team that developed the National Standards for Music Education. As MENC president, Hinckley conceived and initiated Vision 2020: The Housewright Symposium on the Future of Arts Education. This effort has been credited with providing a blueprint for music education for the future that picks up the work done at the Tanglewood Symposium. Hinckley received the Hall of Fame Award from FMEA and the ACE of Hearts Award from Arts for a Complete Education/Florida Alliance for Arts Education.
Why you wanted to be MENC presidents:
"To make a difference in music education by providing a vision for the future. Since my presidency would concur with the change of the millennium, I saw this as a wonderful time to lead the organization to be more forward-thinking."
What do you consider to be the greatest accomplishments during your term as a MENC president in office:
"The conceptualization and implementation of Vision 2020, Development of standards for technology in music education, Establishing web chat rooms for music interest areas, Revitalization of consortium of National Arts Education Associations (I served as the chair), Collaboration with International Council of Fine Arts Deans, National Accrediting Associations, and Consortium of National Arts Education Associations to produce position paper 'To Move Forward.'"
"I firmly believe that music education makes a difference in the lives of students everyday. As president, I stayed amazed and humbled by the dedication music educators gave to their students and their profession. Truly music was their passion not just their job!"
Lowell Mason Fellows 2003
Mel Clayton (2000-02)
Mel Clayton is a graduate of Eastern Washington University where he earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Education, a Master of Education degree, and his administrative certification. Clayton has a background of thirty-six years in education, including experience at the elementary, junior high, high school, and college levels. He worked for twenty years as a high school/junior high band and orchestra director, and as a high school administrator. For ten years, he served as fine arts coordinator for the Northshore School District near Seattle, Washington. As coordinator of fine arts, Clayton supervised the development of K-12 standards for the arts in that district. In recent years, Clayton has dedicated an increasing amount of time to leadership positions at the school district, state, regional, and national levels. He currently is an adjunct faculty member at Whitworth College in Spokane, WA.
"I have had the amazing opportunity to serve as the national president of this organization, which I will honor and cherish the rest of my life. Thank you to all of those who laid the 100 years of foundation to this wonderful organization and best of luck to all of you who represent the future of music education."
Via E-mail Communication, Sep. 2006
Lowell Mason Fellows 2002
Willie L. Hill, Jr. (2002-04)
Willie Hill is Director of the Fine Arts Center at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst and a Professor of Music Education. He received his B.S. degree from Grambling State University and earned M.M. and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Colorado-Boulder. Hill was a professor of music education, assistant dean at the College of Music at the University of Colorado-Boulder for eleven years and Director of Education for the Thelonious Monk Institute. Prior to his tenure at the University of Colorado, Hill taught instrumental music and served as instrumental music supervisor for 20 years in the Denver Public Schools (DPS).
His professional activities in the Denver area included the following: former member of the Denver Broncos Jazz Ensemble, regular performer at the Denver Auditorium Theater, Paramount Theater, Boettcher Concert Hall and a variety of nightclubs; guest soloist with the Garden City Community College, Hastings College, the University of Colorado, and the University of Denver Jazz Ensembles; a freelance performer with George Burns, Liza Minneli, Lena Horn, Lou Rawls, Ben Vareen, Lola Falana, Johnny Mathis, Sammy Davis Jr., Dizzy Gillespie, James Mody, Jon Faddis, and many others. As a woodwind specialist, he has been a faculty member of the Clark Terry Great Plains Jazz Camp, Founder and Co-Director of the Rich Matteson-Telluride Jazz Academy, and the Mile High Jazz Camp in Boulder, CO. The Colorado Clarinet Choir was chosen to represent the United States in London, England (1984) at the International Clarinet Symposium and Hill was a member of that touring organization. His conducting experiences include numerous DPS Citywide Honor performances, All-State Jazz Ensembles, All-County Bands, Musical Director at The Schwayder and Bonfils Theaters.
He is a Past President of MENC: National Association for Music Education; Past-President of the International Association of Jazz Educators (IAJE); member of the writing team for MENC's Vision 2020; member of the national board of directors for Young Audiences, Inc.; and is Past-President of the Colorado Music Educators Association and Pi Kappa Lambda. In January, 2001 Hill was the recipient of the prestigious Lawrence Berk Leadership Award presented by the International Association of Jazz Educators. In 1998, he was inducted into the Colorado Music Educators Hall of Fame. He is a national artist and clinician for Yamaha Musical Instrument Company. He also co-authored Learning to Sight-Read Jazz, Rock, Latin, and Classical Styles (Ardsley House Publication), and authored The Instrumental History of Jazz (N2K, Inc.) and Approaching the Standards (Warner Brothers Publication, 1999).
Lowell Mason Fellows 2003
David Circle (2004-06)
David Circle is the performing arts coordinating teacher for the Blue Valley (Kansas) School District. He received his B.M.E. and Masters degrees from Emporia State University, Emporia, Kansas, and his Ph.D. from Peabody College for Teachers, Nashville, Tennessee. Prior to moving to Blue Valley, he was Director of Fine Arts in the Shawnee Mission (Kansas) School District. In addition to his administrative experience, Circle has taught at the elementary, junior high, and high school levels, and served as assistant professor in the Burris Lab School at Ball State University, and conductor of the Kansas City Youth Symphony. He is a past president of the Southwestern Division of MENC and the Kansas Music Educators Association (KMEA), and was inducted into the KMEA Hall of Fame.
"Many changes have taken place in our society since 1907 regarding business, travel, communication, legislation and education. Music education has survived these changes and challenges and will do so for the next one hundred years because music is basic to our human nature."
Lynn Brinckmeyer (2006-08)
Lynn M. Brinckmeyer is Assistant Professor of Music and Director of Choral Music Education at Texas State University. Her degrees include a Bachelor of Science in Education and Master of Music Education from Eastern New Mexico University, and a Ph.D. in Music Education from The University of Kansas. In New Mexico she taught elementary music and middle school choir and taught higher education in the Pacific Northwest.
Past offices include: President for the Northwest Division of MENC, Music Educators Journal Editorial Board, Washington Music Educators Association General Music Curriculum Chair, and Conn-Selmer University Advisory Board. In addition to chairing the Eastern Washington University Music Department for six years, she received both the PTI Excellence in Teaching Award and the CenturyTel Award for outstanding faculty. She founded the Eastern Washington University Girls' Chorus while teaching at EWU. She also served as Artistic Director for the Idaho State Children's Chorus in Pocatello, Idaho and the South Hill Children's Chorus in Spokane, Washington.
At Texas State University Brinckmeyer teaches courses in choral music education and directs the University Singers. She also serves as the artistic director for the New Hill Country Youth Chorus. Brinckmeyer has conducted, lectured, presented master classes, and performed across the United States, and in Korea, Taiwan, Amsterdam, Italy and the British Isles. Recent All-State performances include: Oregon Music Educators Association Elementary All-State Honor Choir, Idaho Music Educators Association Elementary All-State Honor Choir, and Washington Music Educators Association Elementary All State Honor Choir. Other ensembles and conducting venues include: Eastern Washington University Concert Choir, South Carolina Junior High Choral Festival, Washoe County Honor Choir (Reno), Spokane Festival of the Arts, Idaho Washington Concert Chorale, Boise All City Honor Choir and Orchestra, Mountain Treble Choir Festival, Bi-County Gala Concert, Panorama Choral Festival, and Gem State High School Girls Choral Festival.
"Teaching is an honorable profession. We should treasure the fact that we are contributing to the quality of life for our students, and we need to ensure that music education remains a vital component in all children's educational lives."
MENC, 1907-2007: A Century of Service to Music Education, MENC, 2007.
Barbara L. Geer (2008-2010)
Barbara L. Geer is a music consultant in the Winston-Salem/Forsyth County (North Carolina) School System. She has taught elementary, middle and high school vocal, instrumental, and general music. In addition to her instructional duties, she has served as a supervisor of the secondary band, choral and orchestra programs and provided extensive mentorship for college students and new teachers.
She received the BME degree from St. Andrews Presbyterian College in Laurinburg (North Carolina) and the MM degree from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. She has a distinguished record of state and national leadership experience having served as president of both the Southern Division of MENC, and the North Carolina Music Educators Association. During her term on the MENC National Executive Board, she served as a member of the Finance Committee, National Executive Committee, National Convention Task Force, Vision 20/20 Seminar, and planning committees for national conferences in Washington, Nashville and Minneapolis. She is currently a member of the Lowell Mason Fellows Selection Committee and the National Anthem Project Committee. Additionally, she chairs the North Carolina In-Service Conference and district vocal and large choral festivals.
Lowell Mason Fellows 2005