A Message from the President

Brad North Welcome back. I hope all of you had a restful summer and are energized has we enter the 2005-2006 school year. As many of you know I took over the Capitol Section presidency last November at the request of the Capitol Section board. It has been a rewarding ten months and I am looking forward to serving you for another year. I want to take this opportunity to discuss Capitol Section's Board goals for the next year, the importance of each of us becoming involved in Capitol Section, and our plans for the 2006 CMEA Conference. Over the past months the Capitol Section board has accomplished a lot. We held our 17th annual award banquet, elected a new vice president, higher education representative, jazz representative, and orchestra representative, have reestablished the newsletter, and reinstated the CSUS-Capital Section Jazz Festival. However there is still a lot left to do. This year we will reinstate the elementary representative board position and work towards reinstated the elementary music conference, we will continue to serve and inform our membership via our newsletter and web page, and we will reinstate the Capitol Section winter conference. This is where you come in. If we are truly going to serve all of our Capitol Section members we need all of our members to become involved. Your first step is to keep your membership current. It is important that all music educators, elementary to the university, support Capitol Section, CMEA and MENC by maintaining your membership. And remember to participate in Capitol Section's honor groups and Golden Empire Music Festivals you must be a current member of MENC. It is equally important that all of us give some time to these organizations. I am concerned with the difficulty we have year after year finding board members. I know that each one of you are very busy, as are all the current board members, however we need for all our music educators to become involved. This is the time for you to really make a change in music education in Capitol Section. Please, when we make a call for new board members, say yes, you will love every minute of it. Finally I want to touch on the CMEA Annual Conference this March, here in Sacramento. This is a great time for all us to meet, exchange ideas, attend workshops, and socialize. Please start planning now to attend. Sign up early for the best deal and keep your eyes open for information on the Capitol Section social. We plan to make it a great time for all. Let's show the rest of the state what Capitol Section teachers can do and I look forward to working with all of you this year.