The Batavia City School District is proud to announce it has been honored for the first time with the NAMM Foundation's Best Communities for Music Education designation for its outstanding commitment to music education. 

Now in its 25th year, the designation is awarded to districts that demonstrate outstanding achievement in providing music access and education to all students.

To qualify for the Best Communities designation, the Batavia City School District answered detailed questions about funding, graduation requirements, music class participation, instruction time, facilities, support for the music program, and community music-making programs. 

Responses were verified by school officials and reviewed by The Music Research Institute at the University of Kansas.

“I am deeply honored to see BCSD’s commitment to music education recognized by the NAMM Foundation. This award is a testament to the rich, vibrant opportunities our incredibly talented and dedicated music department staff continue to provide, ensuring every BCSD student can experience the transformative power of music,” said Superintendent Jason Smith. "As a proud product of our district's music program myself, I am beyond thrilled to see BCSD receive this extraordinary recognition.”

“This prestigious award from the NAMM Foundation is a tribute to the dedication of our music department staff, our students' passion, and our families' unwavering support. Together, we have fostered a thriving music education environment that celebrates creativity and collaboration. I am immensely grateful for our community's commitment to keeping music an essential part of our education system,” said Melzie Case, BCSD Music Department Chair.

Research into music education continues to demonstrate educational/cognitive and social skill benefits for children who make music: After two years of music education, researchers found that participants showed more substantial improvements in how the brain processes speech and reading scores than their less-involved peers and that students who are involved in music are not only more likely to graduate high school but also to attend college as well. 

In addition, everyday listening skills are stronger in musically trained children than in those without music training. Significantly, listening skills are closely tied to the ability to: perceive speech in a noisy background, pay attention, and keep sounds in memory. 

Later in life, individuals who took music lessons as children show stronger neural processing of sound: young adults and even older adults who have not played an instrument for up to 50 years show enhanced neural processing compared to their peers. Not to mention, social benefits include conflict resolution, teamwork skills, and how to give and receive constructive criticism.

Weighing out the options of a permissible 2.26 percent tax increase versus going whole hog for a super-majority vote and a 4 percent increase, or having no increase at all and actually tightening the belt and eliminating expenses for a tentative $60.5 million budget, Batavia City School board members covered the gamut of responses to a nearly $1.4 million budget gap during its second review Tuesday evening.

Toward the end of a 90-minute session, Vice President John Reigle posed a question that was perhaps three years too late. 

“Call me crazy, but should we start planning now? Those three years knowing, I mean, I kind of feel like we knew these COVID grants were running out. We should have been proactive and tried to replace that money instead of being in this position now. I think it's very difficult,” Reigle said.

That is, at least some of them have agreed they would consider overriding the state mandated tax cap increase, which for the city district is .72 percent. Members had a first go-round of the 2024-25 budget during Monday’s board meeting.

“If it is coming down to it, we’re going to have to look at every option,” Vice President John Reigle said.

Empowering students, maximum potential, socially responsible citizens.

Those are some of the words “that popped out to me when I first became a principal when I started to dig into learning a little bit about Batavia,” High School Principal Jennifer Wesp said during Tuesday’s Batavia City Schools Board of Education meeting. “And then things like safe and nurturing environment, high moral character, and successfully meeting life’s challenges. So coming into this, I really was focused on how can we make sure that our culture is helping our students to rise to be the best students that they can be? And how can they take hose steps to really show the independence that they have within themselves?

“So I just wanted to say that I really grounded myself in the mission and vision as I started to think about the work that I was going to do,” she said.

The vote means that the capital project will proceed in 2024 to install two synthetic turf fields for the high school, a baseball and softball field each, and upgrades for every school building within the city school district.

District officials applauded the support, including school board Vice President John Reigle, who said that he was “very pleased and proud” about the results of the district’s Reimagined capital project vote.

“Our leadership team did a great job promoting the project and explaining the many benefits of the project to our community,” Reigle said to The Batavian Thursday night. “This is a great step towards ensuring our district keeps the high standards that our district students and community expect and deserve. I’d like to thank the community for their support in voting to approve this capital project for our district.”

Likewise, board member Alice Ann Benedict was also pleased with the results and thanked the community for its demonstration of support for the project.

“I am thrilled with the overwhelming support of the BCSD Capital Project. The project was well-advertised and explained to the community over the last number of weeks. We’ve had a lot of feedback, mostly positive, from the community,” Benedict said to The Batavian. “I am always pleased when the voting community supports the recommendations of the Superintendent and administrators. Keeping our buildings safe and up-to-date is the most important part of this project because our students and staff are the most important users of these buildings. There are numerous safety improvements included for all of the schools.

“With most of the questions coming because of the artificial turf cost on two fields, our athletes can be out on the fields a lot earlier because this project will improve the drainage issues our district fields suffer with,” she said. “We have also heard  positive feedback about the moving of the grades, especially fifth grade back to John Kennedy.”

The BCSD Reimagined Project's next phase will include engaging in the contractor bid process over the next 12 months, and the district expects the first phase of construction to begin in the spring of 2025. The project is scheduled to be completed by the end of the 2027 calendar year. BCSD will provide additional updates and project details to the Batavia community as they become available, officials said in a press release issued Thursday night.

“Thank you to the Batavia community for your steadfast support in passing our BCSD Reimagined Capital Improvement Project,” Superintendent Jason Smith said in the release. “With this initiative, we will address essential infrastructure needs across all of our buildings. These funds will also help us convert Robert Morris into a modern early childhood education center and enhance our athletic fields for year-round use. Your vote reflects a deep commitment to our students and schools' ongoing improvement and future success.”

Board President John Marucci added, “We are profoundly grateful to the Batavia community for their support, to our Batavia City School District leadership for their visionary guidance in spearheading this important project, and to our collaborative construction partners and Buildings and Grounds Committee, who played an integral role in its conception.” 

“It's a remarkable achievement to bring this project to fruition with a zero percent tax increase, reflecting our shared commitment to fiscal responsibility and educational excellence,” Marucci said. “This collective support and collaboration are invaluable in shaping a brighter future for the Batavia City School District students.”

Recipients need to have been an active performer or music educator, be at least 10 years out of high school, and have had a successful musical career in either performance, composition, education, theater or audio recording.

Nominations may be done posthumously to honor deceased musicians and educators from BCSD as well.

Complete and submit the application by March 28, 2024. 

Of the nine people at Thursday’s Batavia City Schools capital project public hearing, only one was a district resident who came to hear the presentation.

The remaining people in the auditorium were district staff, board members and an architect from the project design team. Although Herb Schroeder was the lone attendee, he came armed with a list of questions about the $45 million district-wide project.

It was 14 months ago when Batavia City Schools shed light on a Comptroller’s report that found the district paid some $17,000 in annual fees for hundreds of lost technology equipment from 2021-22. 

The report stated that the district did not