Andrew Cote, 2024 Music Educator Grammy Award Quarterfinalist (Merrimack College, North Andover, MA)

hi my name is Andrew Cody and I'm honored to be a quarter finalist for the 2024 music educator Grammy Award one thing that Dr Cody has taught me at my time here during Merrimack is that anyone can do music it doesn't matter if you sing or play piano or have never done either if you want it and you love it you can do it you can get involved and there's a place for you when I was hired at Merrimack College in the fall of 2020 I was asked to build upon a brand new music Major to start a new music technology program and help form a new marching band in three years and with my colleagues in a really really supportive Administration we went from turning one music Major into 30 and we turned our pep band of 25 into a marching band of 80. I don't think any students here question Dr Cody's commitment to the program the program's growth in the past couple years since he's been working here has been exponential I mean we have we wouldn't have a full Marching Band program or a music major as successful as it is now without him he's always working on weekends showing up when he doesn't have to always inspiring students to go that extra mile one of my proudest moments as a teacher was the day our marching band performed for the first time for a home football game instead of the attendees you know getting up during halftime and using the restroom instead nobody left their seats everyone in attendance stayed to watch our school's marching band perform for the very first time and to see the look on our students faces as they marched off the field to Applause from really such a tight-knit community it's truly something I'll never forget a way that Dr Cody makes a difference in his students lives is about how involved he is he is always on campus he is always willing to help I've been in the studio with him until eight o'clock at night working on things when he didn't have to be there and he does it with everyone and it's just a really great environment and it's really helpful for the students one of the most significant challenges I faced was starting the music technology program at my school the first semester I ever taught music production for Merrimack I had to teach over half the classes remotely and a significant number of my students never even attended the class and had to work from home normally I would teach production in a really tightly controlled environment but instead I had to design the class so students could complete the assignments from home with really limited technology this class experience inspired me to rewrite our curriculum to focus more on training students to learn these Concepts behind sound recording and production on really more entry-level equipment this allows students to produce professional quality music from home without requiring professional level equipment it also reinforced my educational philosophy of really trying to meet students where they are and not requiring students to be at a certain ability level in order for them to major in music Dr Cody has taught me lots of compositional and arranging skills like how to write music out on a staff my first year I didn't know how to read music at all and he's brought me to the point where I'm writing full marching band scores now one way that Dr Cody has shown a commitment to the music program at Merrimack is if you go to any sports game any football game any music event on campus he's probably there either running sound or fixing a last minute bug no one has put more time into music here than Dr Cody I really hope that the work I have done as a music educator can provide more opportunities for students to pursue careers not really just in music but in any field that they're passionate about music education is not about teaching students how to be good at an instrument or how to be a better singer it's about showing students how music is a small example of how we can better know ourselves and better know the world around us see you later thank you so much great work