Madison Youth Choirs
Programs and results
What we aim to solve
Madison Youth Choirs creates empowering musical experiences for over 500 young people ages 7-18 in our community annually, imparting lessons that help them become responsible, compassionate citizens who value the voices of their neighbors. The benefits these singers gain from MYC’s comprehensive music education activities, developed in a culture of open-mindedness, include not only creative experiences, enhanced critical thinking abilities, and leadership skills for the future, but also the understanding that they can have a positive impact on their community right now, even as children. A generous, thoughtful, motivated youth population is of great public value to all in our community. Because we hope to share the benefits of arts education with as many students as possible, we are continually working to make our programs more accessible, affordable, and meaningful to all young people, especially those who have previously been underrepresented or underserved in arts education.
Our programs
What are the organization's current programs, how do they measure success, and who do the programs serve?
Madison Youth Choirs (General)
The Madison Youth Choirs (MYC) was formed through a merger of the Madison Boychoir and Madison Children?s Choir in July 2003. The merger combined over 47 years of service to the Dane County area and streamlined artistic and administrative resources, which increased the impact of our programs to create a dynamic cultural asset for the Dane County community.
MYC accomplishes its mission by offering 9 performing choirs (5 for girls, 4 for boys) and 2 introductory choirs who participate in weekly rehearsals, performances, tours, and music retreats. The program is presented in an environment of sharing, growth, and recreation, allowing MYC to teach discipline, build self-confidence, foster teamwork, and provide constructive activity and positive role models during formative years. The MYC community will be comprised of over 350 singers ages 8-18 from the Dane County area during the 2006-2007 Season.
MYC also serves Madison and surrounding area audiences through public and private performances. The groups that make up the Madison Youth Choirs have regularly performed with outstanding area musical groups such as the Madison and Milwaukee Symphony Orchestras, and the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra. Our choristers have also had the unique opportunity to tour Wisconsin and the Midwest, as well as much of the United States, and internationally in Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Germany, Austria, England, Japan, and Ireland.
Madison Youth Choirs (Performing/Introductory Choirs)
The mission of our core program: To create a community of young musicians dedicated to musical excellence through which we inspire enjoyment, enhance education, and nurture personal, musical, and social development by the study and performance of high-quality and diverse choral literature.
Community Programming
Committed to providing all young people with an equal opportunity to sing in the choirs, MYC has developed several successful initiatives that work towards removing barriers to musical participation. These initiatives include the "Adopt-a-School” choir program, which brings free choral instruction directly to underserved students in the classroom, community-wide choral events like the Madison Boychoir Festival, and a need-based scholarship program which annually awards over $20,000 in tuition assistance for introductory and performing choir students whose families face financial challenges. Through a combination of public concerts, community performance tours, outreach initiatives, and guest appearances, MYC reaches over 20,000 people in our community every year.
Where we work
External reviews
Goals & Strategy
Learn about the organization's key goals, strategies, capabilities, and progress.
Charting impact
Four powerful questions that require reflection about what really matters - results.
What is the organization aiming to accomplish?
Madison Youth Choirs is focused on providing outstanding music education through an innovative teaching philosophy that inspires self-confidence, responsibility, and a spirit of inquiry leading students to become “expert noticers” who ask deeper questions about all they encounter.
In all of our activities, MYC seeks to nurture curious, open-minded, caring and thinking individuals. We seek to break down barriers to arts participation, whether those barriers are financial, perceptual, or physical, collaborating with fellow community organizations whenever possible to maximize our ability to reach youth of all socio-economic backgrounds.
What are the organization's key strategies for making this happen?
MYC’s focus on attracting and retaining a highly accomplished staff of master educators and experienced, forward-thinking arts administrators has laid a strong foundation for organizational excellence and growth. Much of our staff has worked in close collaboration for more than 15 years to ensure that the young people in our programs receive a consistently outstanding, accessible, and meaningful music education experience. Whether our students participate in a one-day workshop or a year-long program, all singers learn to discover the history, cultural context and heart of the music.
Our attention to detail and reflection on the work at hand also extend to our strategy of using participant evaluations and feedback to improve our programs. For example, post-event feedback from students, families, music teachers and our wider community has helped us focus our priorities and make our programs more accessible to students who face a variety of challenges. Involving those we serve in our planning process has also played a major role in the growth of our program participants, up 33% in the past ten years.
Finally, after years of struggling with the limitations of our current program space, which is being used well beyond the capacity it was designed for as our enrollment has increased, we will soon move into a new home at the Madison Youth Arts Center in the heart of our city and the center of Dane County. This state-of-the-art facility will provide safe, accessible and affordable space for dozens of youth arts education programs in our community, and will allow us to more easily collaborate and strategize with fellow creative educators, maximizing our collective impact.
What are the organization's capabilities for doing this?
Madison Youth Choirs upholds a legacy of youth arts excellence going back to 1971, and has served over 5,000 young people in our community, growing into an important role in Dane County’s cultural landscape. In 2003, when Madison Boychoir and Madison Children’s Choir combined to create Madison Youth Choirs, our organization gained administrative efficiency, a comprehensive music education philosophy, and a highly experienced conducting staff, hallmarks of MYC which continue to thrive today.
All of our conductors foster a strong sense of inclusion and respect among choir members, seamlessly integrating students with a variety of challenges and talents into a cohesive group working towards a shared goal. This supportive atmosphere in which all voices are valued has helped MYC maintain a very high retention rate among students, with nearly 85% of eligible singers returning to the program year after year.
What have they accomplished so far and what's next?
In the past 16 years, MYC’s enrollment has more than doubled, with further growth on the horizon as we expand our community outreach programming and prepare to move into a more centrally located home in Dane County, the Madison Youth Arts Center. Additionally, the MYC community is experiencing growth in diversity, transitioning to better represent the greater Dane County communities we serve. More than 24% (up from 8% in 2005) of MYC’s singers are from low-income backgrounds or families of color, who have been traditionally underrepresented in extracurricular arts programs. While this participation growth is promising, we still have a long way to go in order to truly reflect the socio-economic diversity of our community. As we continue to develop our programs in ways that reduce barriers to entry and meet the needs and interests of local young people from a wide variety of backgrounds, we expect our progress towards greater access and equity in arts opportunities to climb accordingly.
We also hope to further diversify our donor base, continuing to welcome new individual contributors, maintain strong relationships with longtime supporters, engage with alumni, and grow our endowment, which more than doubled in the last six years, in order to ensure long-term financial sustainability.
Our program has also gained great respect in the performing arts community over the past decade, both as an exceptional music education program and as a collaborative partner of several professional arts organizations. MYC serves as the official children’s choir of Madison Opera and frequently appears with Madison Symphony Orchestra, creating opportunities for our singers to establish themselves as talented, poised, and highly dependable young artists in front of thousands of audience members each year.
We are eager to take on more ambitious artistic projects as our resources allow, building on the success and impact of past large-scale performances such as the 2008 commission “Greek to Me,” which blended drama, puppetry and music; our 2015 movement-focused collaboration with Madison Ballet; and our two inspiring residencies with guest artist Tony Memmel in 2011 and 2018. As we approach the 50th anniversary of the first Madison Boychoir rehearsal in 2021, we will be in an excellent position to challenge ourselves with musical endeavors that will excite participants, inspire local audiences, and contribute to the repertoire of the larger youth arts community.
Financials
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Operations
The people, governance practices, and partners that make the organization tick.
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Connect with nonprofit leaders
SubscribeBuild relationships with key people who manage and lead nonprofit organizations with GuideStar Pro. Try a low commitment monthly plan today.
- Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
- Access beautifully interactive analysis and comparison tools
- Compare nonprofit financials to similar organizations
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Madison Youth Choirs
Board of directorsas of 07/25/2023
Jen Lattis
Contact Madison Youth Choirs
Madison Youth Choirs
Board leadership practices
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Board orientation and education
Does the board conduct a formal orientation for new board members and require all board members to sign a written agreement regarding their roles, responsibilities, and expectations? Yes -
CEO oversight
Has the board conducted a formal, written assessment of the chief executive within the past year ? Yes -
Ethics and transparency
Have the board and senior staff reviewed the conflict-of-interest policy and completed and signed disclosure statements in the past year? Yes -
Board composition
Does the board ensure an inclusive board member recruitment process that results in diversity of thought and leadership? Yes -
Board performance
Has the board conducted a formal, written self-assessment of its performance within the past three years? Yes