{"id":8666,"date":"2025-05-07T17:22:00","date_gmt":"2025-05-07T20:22:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/?p=8666"},"modified":"2025-05-08T14:17:26","modified_gmt":"2025-05-08T17:17:26","slug":"band-program-at-south-queens-middle-school-will-be-here-next-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/2025\/05\/07\/band-program-at-south-queens-middle-school-will-be-here-next-year\/","title":{"rendered":"Band program at South Queens Middle School ‘will be here next year in some form’"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"

Members of the South Queens Middle School Grade 7\/8 band perform at the Queens County Music Festival in late April. (Rick Conrad)<\/p><\/div>\n

It looks like the band program at South Queens Middle School in Liverpool will live to play another day, though it’s unclear in what form.<\/span><\/p>\n

Parents and others vented their frustrations online a couple of weeks ago when they heard the school planned to cut the program for next year.<\/span><\/p>\n

It came on the eve of the 80th annual Queens County Music Festival at the Astor Theatre. The festival features young musicians and vocalists from school and private music programs being scored on their performances by trained adjudicators.<\/span><\/p>\n

The middle school\u2019s Grade 7 and 8 band competed at the festival.<\/span><\/p>\n

Principal Stacy Thorburn told QCCR on Wednesday that she hopes to have good news for students and parents by the end of the week.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s in the works. I\u2019m in conversations to find out how it will look next year.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The program includes about 40 students.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

In a message to students and their families on Friday, the school said they\u2019re looking at ways to continue offering it next year.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cSchool administration is having ongoing conversations with nearby schools to explore potential collaboration opportunities and are looking at creative staffing solutions, all with the intention to continue offering the band program,\u201d the note read.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cAdditionally, discussions regarding the band program are planned with the school advisory council.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Thorburn didn\u2019t want to comment on what led to the worries about the program’s survival.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI would rather not because there are lots of things that go into play. And I’ve had conversations with our (school advisory council) and members of our community who have asked so I\u2019d rather keep it at that for now, until we know for sure what\u2019s happening.<\/span><\/p>\n

“It will be here next year in some form.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Email: rickconradqccr@gmail.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Listen to the audio version of this story below<\/p>\nhttps:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/southqueensschoolbandmay725.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It looks like the band program at South Queens Middle School in Liverpool will live to play another day, though it’s unclear in what form. Parents and others vented their frustrations online a couple of weeks ago when they heard the school planned to cut the program for next year. It came on the eve […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,5],"tags":[38,3077,138,39,3079,3078,49,3076,276,3070],"class_list":["post-8666","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-community-news","category-news-posts","tag-astor-theatre","tag-band-program","tag-education","tag-liverpool","tag-music","tag-music-education","tag-queens-county","tag-queens-county-music-festival","tag-south-queens-middle-school","tag-stacy-thorburn"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8666","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8666"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8666\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8672,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8666\/revisions\/8672"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8666"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8666"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8666"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}