Conference Agenda

How can we, in our music courses, provide students with instruction that maintains high academic standards and accountability while also removing barriers to access in the very design of our course? In striving to apply the principles of Universal Design for Learning (UDL), technology can help us in significant and impactful ways. In this presentation, I will provide concrete strategies and examples from my undergraduate music history, music theory and musicianship, and keyboard skills classes. Syllabi that set generous policies as clear boundaries enable us to support all our students in meaningful ways while not overextending ourselves as instructors or building resentment over working outside our own limits. Pre-recorded lecture videos with interactive questions and closed captioning engage students individually and at their own pace and maintain accountability. Accessible PDFs allow read-aloud features and searching for terms. These technologies and more support students with disabilities by creating a learning space where accommodations are not necessary—they are designed as part of the course and are available to all students, additionally providing inclusion for students with other access barriers, including caregiving responsibilities, inflexible work schedules, precarious housing, and English language learning. This presentation will demonstrate how we can leverage technology in both hybrid asynchronous/in-person and fully asynchronous online models to remove barriers to our students’ educational access.

This paper explores the intersection of my roles as a college music instructor, postsecondary disability services professional, and student of disability studies in public health and postsecondary disability studies. Drawing on my experiences in this unique position, I examine the expanded opportunities that college music instructors, and the field of musicology, have to better support students through Universal Design for Learning (UDL).

As a college music instructor, my commitment to creating inclusive learning environments extends beyond mere compliance to accommodate all learners with diverse needs. My work in postsecondary disability services informs my teaching approaches, empowering me to implement effective accommodations. These accommodations not only meet the requirements of my university’s disability service center but also, through UDL, support strategies that enhance learning for all students.

This paper aims to highlight the importance of interdisciplinary collaboration in enhancing accessibility and accommodations in higher education. I argue that by embracing UDL principles, college instructors can move beyond compliance and discover numerous ways to accommodate students with disabilities in their classrooms. The strategies discussed in this paper include assessment, participation, and classroom engagement techniques that utilize a UDL framework to move beyond compliance with disability laws and regulations to create truly inclusive educational experiences for all learners.

Conventionally, undergraduate music theory asserts that knowledge of form, harmony, counterpoint, and rhythm ought to inform practice and performance. Despite such a lofty ambition, music theory instruction falls short. That is to say, all too often, the music theory classroom becomes a space for unilateral assertions about musical experience and ableist assumptions of students' engagement with course material. For instance, the valuation of teleological listening—i.e., listening for phrase lengths, harmonic resolutions, and long-term voice leading—marginalizes students with attention and autism spectrum disorders, anxiety and depression, and anyone whose experience of time diverges from rigid preconceptions of music as alternating states of restlessness and repose. This short presentation offers suggestions for activities that may be implemented across an array of modalities—online, in person, and (a-)synchronous—that foster inclusivity using the principles of universal design (UDL). Briefly summarized, these activities use short audio and video clips (:30 to one minute), kinesthetic learning (dancing, drawing, generating plot diagrams, collage, etc.), and practice with descriptive terminology in discussion settings to analyze pieces within electronic, experimental, and minimalist genres. Not only do these activities provide alternative pathways into music that, owing to its less obvious or "simple" melodic and harmonic content, is rarely studied in the undergraduate music theory core, they use disability-informed pedagogy to celebrate innovations in texture, timbre, and narrative. Although inspired by contemporary music, these activities could illuminate compositional procedures of any style or time period.

In an article for The New York Times entitled “Classical Music Attracts Older Audiences. Good,” Anthony Tommasini wrote, “whether old or young, if you have the patience to embrace such experiences, you are primed to love classical music. If you’re too fidgety, then this art form is probably not for you.” Setting aside Tomassini’s blatant ableism, it is an unfortunate truth that the NYT music critic could very well have been describing the music classroom. It is no wonder then that “core staples” of musical pedagogy fail to meet the Universal Design for Learning Guidelines and, as a result, run the risk of leaving neurodivergent students far behind their neurotypical peers. Although neurodivergent behaviors are often considered signs of “laziness” or “self-control,” through this talk, I draw on my experience as a neurodivergent student and scholar to demonstrate how neurodivergence can contribute to the classroom learning environment. Furthermore, I wish to dispel any notion that making a curriculum that is accessible to neurodivergent students inherently dilutes the quality of education provided throughout a course. Through case studies of my own classroom, I aim to demonstrate simple and effective ways of adapting existing course structures to set neurodivergent students up for success. Drawing upon pedagogical research from other disciplines, I further conclude that these techniques benefit neurotypical and neurodivergent students alike and substantially increase course performance.

One of the core challenges of teaching music is that it is very sensory: the sound of the music, the physical touch or movement of the musician, and the notation in the score on the page. This emphasis on the senses becomes a challenge when we have students who may have disabilities related to these senses or learn differently. Further, in music history courses, students are often required to listen to a piece while following the score and, in real time, process what they are hearing and connect it to prior knowledge, making it difficult for those with processing difficulties. How do we engage with and teach our students about an art that relies so heavily on the senses in a way that benefits all learners? How do we overcome these barriers while conducting our classes in the way we best see fit?

Drawing on the work of Kish (2023); McCord, Gruben, and Rathberger (2014); Tobin and Behling (2018); Quaglia (2015); Schuiling (2023); and Byron (2018), I will provide simple strategies for how UDL can be used to provide multiple means of representing sound and score and multiple means of action and engagement for students to demonstrate their knowledge of this material. These strategies will not only benefit students with disabilities, but also benefit all students, regardless of whether they have or need accommodations. Because these strategies can be either analogue or digital (or both), they can be used equally as well in face-to-face classes as online and hybrid ones.