Music makes us feel alive, doesn’t it? When we sing and make music together, we’re happy.

Music is such a universal language that it connects all the people of the world. It allows us to express our most powerful feelings and our bravest ideals. It teaches us about each other and helps us shape our world.

Yet, sadly, we’ve seen music losing its place in our culture- treated like any other commercial product, and simultaneously, devalued in our schools. In many places, music programs for students are a vanishing species.

As a result, for most American children, music has declined into a passive consumer experience. They think of music in terms of 99 cent downloads, and electronic background noise for video games. By comparison, I ask you to consider the role music and music making played in your own childhood, and the value it holds for you now.

The contrast may be dramatic.

Unless we do something about the loss now, at this critical and promising time in our history, our culture stands to lose its most vital, creative, and sacred form of communication in all except the most privileged communities. The majority of America’s children have already lost the songs that captured our unique social history.

Guitars in the Classroom is bringing them back.

By joining us, you can do something positive now. You can become a participant in an exciting movement that is restoring creative music making to education for just pennies per child. For the cost of a latte, you can make sure 7 children get music at school this year. For the cost of a dinner out, you can make sure a teacher gets six weeks of training that will ensure that every student in her class gets music not just this year, but for many years to come. You can effect a change.

Guitars in the Classroom has already taught over 8,000 teachers to play guitar and use music to make learning easy and fun for school kids across America. We’ve been able to do this because of people like you who know that making music is essential, builds character, compassion, intelligence, practical skills, and a vital culture.

From California to Illinois to Virignia, teachers are participating in innovative free programs that teach them to strum, sing, and integrate music daily. They are overcoming their doubts and shyness, and bravely developing their skills as effective song leaders and musical resources for children, becoming in many places, the only chance for American children to experience the joys and benefits of making music.

Remember that school teachers are equal opportunity musical leaders- with their involvement, EVERY CHILD gets music. And this is musical exposure that budget cuts and demands for higher test scores cannot take away. Your contribution to Guitars in the Classroom’s work guarantees that for so many young people, the music will be restored.

Classroom teachers with GITC reach, on average, 67 children every week with music making. And in our high-spirited workshops, their love of teaching is renewed. They develop new tools for engaging all kinds of student in learning everything from math to language arts through singing and subject-oriented songwriting. For teachers, a group we might recognize as the backbone of our society, GITC becomes a new resource for effective instruction, creativity, and career satisfaction. And the social investment you make when you contribute to GITC literally lasts lifetimes, traveling from teacher to student, year after year. This is why we say, “Reach a teacher and inspire a generation!”

You know, with GITC, it costs about $100 a year to teach a teacher how to play guitar and bring the joy of learning through music back to school. Just imagine thousands of strumming and singing teachers getting hundreds of thousands of kids excited about learning.

So please consider joining us. Help GITC save the future of music for America. Make sure that young people learn to carry on the traditions and songs that tell our American stories, old and new. Together, we can reverse the trend to commodify music. We can restore it to its rightful place- in education and in our lives.

Please join this exciting grass-roots effort by making a tax-deductible donation now. We will email you information about GITC and how you can get involved. We’d like to tell you more about how GITC can come to your community and schools.

Curious about levels of sponsorship? Please click here or simply choose the button below to start making a difference today.

Thank you so much for your time and good will,

Jessica Anne Baron