For the past 3 years summers, we’ve held a training event for City Music Network teachers & administrators about how to  teach using the PULSE Music Method. This event started out pretty small and a little chaotic, but nevertheless was a great learning experience for everyone, especially our team. Since then, the website, our team, the Network and this event have all grown exponentially!

This year’s PULSE Training Institute (or PTI) will be held from July 19th to the 23rd, which is also the 2nd week of the Berklee 5-Week Program. The timing is more than a coincidence- we’d really like the teachers to be able to observe a few of the ensembles in their earlier developmental stages.

We’ve been planning this event for months now, trying to brainstorm, consolidate, revise, and organize the sessions. Folks planning an event can empathize with the tangibles of this process: the many documents, spreadsheets, and e-mails, all of which became a little overwhelming.

We brought some post-it notes & markers to our latest planning meeting so we move things around and make sense of it all.

We even color coded the various events for these categories: (1) Teaching with PULSE, (2) Professional Development, (3) Network Panels, and everyone’s favorite (4) Free time!

Although we’ve covered a lot of ground already, we have a long way to go. With all of our hard work and so many of our new Network members in attendance, this year is sure to be a great event, and as always, an incredible learning experience for everyone!