Edward Gordon criticizes rap in schools and calls for music programs
Edward Gordon, president of Nubian Conservatory of Music and a former NYC teacher, argues rap has few redeeming qualities and should not be brought into schools. He calls for orchestras, choruses, bands, and repair of a school organ.
It's on.
Mr.
Chairman of the committee, good afternoon.
My name is Edward Gordon.
I'm the president of the Nubian Conservatory of Music.
It is a small private music school in Brooklyn, New York.
I come to you as an educator of over 50 years experience.
And 31 of those years were spent in the classrooms of the New York City public school system.
I am a former parent of the New York school system and now a grandparent of the New York school system.
Mayor Mumdani wants to bring rap poetry into the system.
I have expressed in writing why I do not think that that is a good idea.
If we are speaking honestly about rap, it has very few redeeming qualities.
No one is learning how to sing properly, how to play an instrument.
Many of the people that it glorifies are either ex-drug dealers or ex-convicts.
Please don't get me wrong.
I am all for giving people a second chance, but I was taught that role models have to be held to a higher standard.
And we have wonderful role models out there, such as Mariah Carey or Lawrence Brownlee, the African-American metropolitan opportunist.
We see young men holding their groins for periods of time.
And there is the filthy language which often degrades.
It's black people and especially black women.
The bottom line is that a 10-year-old black boy was trampled to death at a so-called rap concert.
I want something better for my granddaughter.
Our children need orchestras, choruses, and bands.
Erasmus Hall High School has an electronic organ sitting there collecting dust, but it needs about $2,000 worth of work to make it fully functional.
That figure is probably higher by now.
Sorry, my sinuses.
Oh, as I got that estimate a few years ago.
No one wants to help me raise money.
Just finish up your last sentence, please.
No one wants to help me raise money to repair that instrument.
Thank you.
And, you know, we heard, I think, one other person talk about the arts, and I think the arts...
Can and should be integrated into the portrait of a graduate as well.
For me, at least, my own personal experience, someone who, you know, theater and music was integral to my middle and high school experience and someone who then as a teacher saw theater and music as something that was transformative for my students.