The Buffalo Urban Music Project (BUMP) is a community music program housed in Rockwell Hall at Buffalo State. At BUMP, 4th through 8th grade students living in the Western New York region participate in ensembles, classes, and lessons lead by Buffalo State faculty and undergraduate music education majors.
The BUMP program is housed in Rockwell Hall at SUNY Buffalo State and offers instruction in:
Saturdays, 10:00 a.m. - noon
September 30–December 16, 2017
*No classes on October 7 and November 25
$20 per semester, 10 sessions
Scholarships available
Rockwell Hall 106
1300 Elmwood Avenue, Buffalo, NY 14222
Dr. Mark Filsinger, Assistant Professor of Music Education
716-878-6420
Launched on the Buffalo State campus in 2005 as the Campus West After School Program for student K-8, this instructional music program spawned nationally published research and was authoritatively cited as best practice in urban K-12/higher education partnerships. Now know as BUMP, the program has been expanded and is offered to students throughout the Western New York region.
BUMP now serves students at several schools in Buffalo and beyond.
The program’s mission is to
BUMP enhances the music education of middle school students in the city of Buffalo through offering high-quality music instruction. Students are bussed to campus from their respective schools, and receive group instruction in string, wind and percussion, jazz, and vocal ensembles. Within those ensembles, students receive individualized instruction from interns and instruction in music theory, improvisation, and composition—learning that enriches their public school music experiences.
As they prepare for careers as music educators, undergraduate music education majors at Buffalo State gain valuable teaching experience as interns for BUMP. Interns currently register for a special topics course (MUS389) supervised by BUMP program coordinator and assistant professor of music education, Dr. Mark Filsinger. Interns submit weekly lesson plans and are observed by the program coordinator each week. They receive feedback, write personal reflections, and set goals to develop and hone their music teaching skills.
BUMP provides an exemplary model for music education. Through developing best practices based on current research findings, BUMP provides a model for music teaching and learning for our music education undergraduates, as well as for in-service music teachers and administrators from our area and beyond. In addition, the supervised pre-service teaching experience our interns gain is a unique aspect of our degree and provides a model for undergraduate music education curricula.
The Music Department is committed to the development of BUMP.
In 2013, a full-time faculty member was charged to serve as liaison to the community and build and expand upon partnerships. Since that time, jazz and string components were added to BUMP for the first time and a special topics course was established in which interns receive course credit. Moving forward, the goal is to create a comprehensive program for music teaching and learning that includes students of various ages, experiences, and backgrounds.
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