Grant supports Eastman Pathways

CED Director Howard Potter works with former Pathways student Chaz Bruce.

music program between the Eastman School of Music and the Rochester City School District that benefits inner-city youth has received a $20,000 grant from the Ronald McDonald House Charities of Rochester.

Since 1997, Eastman Pathways has provided approximately 70 motivated city school students each year with scholarship aid that allows them to pursue music studies through Eastman's Community Education Division (CED) at little or no cost. Fourth- through 12th-graders may take weekly music lessons on an instrument or in voice as well as a variety of music classes taught through the CED. Scholarship recipients follow different paths depending upon their ages and ability levels. Each path requires commitment and communication among students and their parents, CED faculty, and music teachers from the school district.

Specifically, the grant will go directly into the Eastman Pathways Endowed Fund, which was established in 2003 through a three-year, $1 million grant under the Talented Students in the Arts Initiative, a collaboration of the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and the Surdna Foundation. That award included $240,000 in outright funding to support Pathways operations in 2003-05 and $760,000 in endowed support to help permanently sustain the program. The Eastman School must match the endowment portion by raising an additional $760,000 by June 2006.

"Ronald McDonald House Charities has generously supported Eastman Pathways on an annual basis since the program's inception in 1997," says Eastman School Director and Dean James Undercofler. "We are extremely grateful for their recent gift to the Pathways Endowed Fund, which will help ensure that this exceptional program will be available to talented Rochester city students for years to come."

Eastman Pathways is a program of the William Warfield Partnership, a collaboration since 1996 between the Eastman School and the school district, designed to provide a variety of diverse music opportunities for students and teachers.

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