October 13th marked the inaugural teacher training workshop by Little Kids Rock for teachers from Stockton’s Elmwood School who will be integrating the exciting Modern Band curriculum at their school in Stockton, California.

Now in our third year of partnership supporting Little Kids Rock and their successful Modern Band Program we are excited to see the first school in our own hometown to adopt the program.  Currently with over 190,000 students participating nationwide in Modern Band curriculum, Northern California has about 7,000 students in the Bay Area and this new program with Stockton Unified School District marks the first school to here in the Central Valley Region.

The new program at Elmwood grew out of a Spring Introductory Workshop in which the Blackwing Foundation, the Stockton Unified School District and the Music Education Department of the University of the Pacific based in Stockton invited local area teachers and a few of the University students in music education to participate and learn more about Little Kids Rock and the Modern Band program.

As part of our ongoing outreach efforts we recently also partnered up with Little Kids Rock’s West Coast Director Nate Anderson to produce this video about Little Kids Rock and our collaboration to help support outreach efforts specifically in Northern California’s Central Valley.