BOSTON
In what Berklee College of Music
President Roger Brown calls a “psychological victory for the institution,” the
board of trustees recently adopted an amended mission statement for the college
that acknowledges the historical contributions that African descendants have
made to the development of the contemporary American musical genres on which
Berklee’s curriculum and training are based.
“Founded on jazz and popular music rooted in the
African cultural diaspora, our comprehensive curriculum is distinctly
contemporary in its content and approach, and embraces the principal musical
movements of our time,” is how the second paragraph of the revised mission
statement now reads.
And apparently,
the change comes none too soon.
“People have been talking about this for a long
time,” says Myra Hindus, the college’s vice president of cultural diversity.
According to
Brown, the Association of Faculty of African Descent has “long felt like the
college needs to recognize its roots and change its behavior to accompany that
recognition. AFAD came up with the notion of amending the mission statement.”
AFAD, headed by
Diane Richardson, an associate professor of voice, is part of a 23-member
steering committee doing a comprehensive review of the curriculum to better
reflect the college’s mission.
“Our focus in
that regard is to work towards making sure that we have a core course here at
Berklee that teaches where the music came from,” Richardson
says, adding that faculty are looking within their own departments and doing
their own surveys to determine which areas can be improved.
