Recruiting Strategies for Teaching in a Pandemic

Teaching in a pandemic is probably one of the most difficult experiences that many of us have faced since entering the education profession. With minimal notice and ambiguous guidance from administrators, teachers have worked tirelessly to flip from in-person instruction to virtual/hybrid teaching in an effort to provide a quality education to our students. Pandemic teaching has been especially difficult for music educators because our classes are designed for face-to-face interactions where students make music together. Virtual/hybrid instruction has made it difficult for music educators to offer the traditional experiences our students typically enjoy. These traditions are why students joined our programs. However, the absence of them in our current situation are also why students are leaving our school music programs. As a result, through no fault of music teachers, enrollment has declined in many school music programs.

To address this enrollment decline, we must recruit students on three different fronts:

1. Recruit new beginning students into our music programs.
2. Work to keep our current students so they choose to stay in our music programs.
3. Recruit current middle school students so they choose to participate in their high school music program.

While many teachers had successful recruiting strategies from pre-pandemic times (e.g., in-person school visits, recruiting concerts, instruments nights, side-by-side concerts, mentoring programs, teacher trade days, recruitment presentations, summer camps, and letters to potential students), many of those methods are impossible to implement in our current situation. To succeed in our current situation, we must revise our best prior recruitment strategies so they are effective in pandemic teaching. Below are some thoughts on how music teachers can reimagine our past recruitment strategies. I am hopeful these ideas will help you navigate “pandemic recruiting.” I can see myself using many of these strategies even after life returns to “normal.”

Create Opportunities for Virtual Visits

Organizing in-person trips to your feeder schools may be impossible due to current visitation policies. As a result, consider making both recruitment and non-recruitment virtual visits. Non-recruitment visits allow potential students to see you in a non-musician role where you could co-teach a lesson with another teacher in your district or work with students on their other assignments. Imagine spending fifteen minutes a few days per week working with students and creating positive interactions while helping them with a math or science lesson. If you let your personality shine during these interactions and are supportive, students will view you as someone they want to spend time with and be more likely to join your program. Collaborating with other teachers in your district also demonstrates that you care about more than just recruiting for your music program.

Including your current students in virtual visits is also a great way to excite them. Imagine current students Zooming into the classrooms of their favorite elementary or middle school teachers to work with younger students. Your students will love this because they get to see a favorite past teacher, and those teachers will enjoy catching up with their prior students. This is a win-win because it allows us to recruit new students into our programs while also including our current students in the recruitment process. This could become a recruitment activity that current students look forward to throughout the year.

The best part is virtual visits are easier to organize than traditional in-person visits. Virtual visits do not require reserving busses, completing field trip forms, moving equipment, or collecting permission slips. These can be arranged with a few emails and minutes of your time. This strategy is something I would definitely take advantage of in post-pandemic times.

Share Your Students’ Talents

Our students are talented both inside and outside of the music classroom, and we need to share their talents with potential students. Watching videos of your students playing excerpts from recital pieces, clips from prior concerts, a new a pop tune they just learned, or culturally meaningful music to them may motivate some potential students. While many will find those videos inspiring, others need another reason to join your program. To encourage these students, consider sharing short videos to highlight your current students’ non-musical interests. These videos could include short discussions or demonstrations of other activities your students participate in (e.g., sports, robotics, theater/drama, ukulele club, serving as a class officer, or National Honor Society). They could also highlight your students’ non-musical hidden talents. Imagine sharing short videos of your students flipping water bottles, sticking pencils to the wall, dabbing, dancing, or other “cool” trends.

While music is important, remember it is not the only reason students join our programs. Some join because they have a social connection or share similar interest with someone already in the program. To inspire all potential students, highlight your current students’ musical and non-musical talents during the recruitment process. Having your current students assist with making these videos will also excite them because it allows them show off their talents for younger students. Student ownership also takes some of the work off our “to do lists.”

“Musician or Alumni of the Week/Month” Video

Another method for motivating potential students is by celebrating our current students’ musical and non-musical accomplishments. I would achieve this by creating a “Musician of the Week/Month” video that features a specific student and any awards, scholarships, or other exciting events in their life. This could be extra meaningful if seniors share information about their awarded scholarships, college acceptances, summer jobs, and post-graduation plans. I would also feature successful alumni in these videos; especially if they have younger siblings who are currently in or could join the music program. Sharing student successes also communicates to potential students and their parents that school musicians who stay in the program throughout high school can earn academic awards, athletic recognition, and college scholarships. That is a common concern for some potential students and their parents, and we should address their fear.

Make a Recruitment Video

Recruitment videos provide basic information to potential students and their parents about our music programs. Since most information is traditionally communicated during in-person presentations, we must find new communication methods since recruiting concerts are not possible at this time. Consider a short recruitment video. These videos appear in many styles that range from very serious to comical. Whatever type of recruitment video you chose to make, pick a style that will motivate potential students in your community. If you need inspiration, look on YouTube for example recruitment videos. Involving your current students in the video production will also make it more impactful. I bet students will volunteer to assist, and you probably have a few students interested in film who would enjoy taking on this project.

Purchase a Recruitment Video

One of the best recruitment videos I have seen over the last year was made by two high school band directors (Mr. White and Mr. Ward). These teachers purchased a video message on Cameo. Cameo is a platform where you can pay a celebrity to make a short video message for you based on the information you provide. Mr. White and Mr. Ward paid Rick Harrison from Pawn Stars to make a recruitment video for their program. In the video, Mr. Harrison encouraged middle school band students to join the high school band by discussing positive elements of the high school band program. To me, using a recognizable celebrity to recruit for their band program was genius. For a nominal fee, they purchased a recruitment video they can use for years to come. This type of video has endless possibilities. While I do not know what celebrity I would choose, I know this could be fun project that will get potential students excited about joining the music program. If going this route, involve your current students when selecting the celebrity. They will make sure you choose someone relevant.