Factors that characterize successful inner-city high school band programs of the north central states of the United States as perceived by administrators, music supervisors and music educators

This study was designed to identify factors and the relationships among factors that administrators and band directors in the inner city schools of cities in the North Central Division of the Music Educators National Conference. Principals, music supervisors and band directors (N = 169) from the inner city school districts of Illinois (Chicago Public Schools), Indiana (Indianapolis Public Schools), Iowa (Des Moines Independent Community School District), Michigan (Detroit Public Schools), Minnesota (Minneapolis Public Schools), Nebraska (Omaha Public Schools), Ohio (Cleveland Municipal School District), and Wisconsin (Milwaukee Public Schools) were surveyed. The Successful Inner City Band Program Inventory (SIBPI), developed by the researcher for the collection of data, contained eleven demographic items and seventy-three items which were answered by using a four point rating scale. The SIBPI was determined to have acceptable content validity and high internal consistency as indicated by Cronbach\u27s coefficient alpha (r = .941). Factors identified as characteristic of successful inner city high school band programs by administrators and band directors were: (1) Extrinsic Outcomes; (2) Teacher Effectiveness; (3) Caliber of the Marching Band; (4) Internal Administrative Program Characteristics; (5) Quality of Performance Outcomes/Teacher\u27s Contribution to that Quality; (6) External Program Characteristics; (7) Contest Participation and Ratings; and (8) Community Perception and Values. Administrators and band directors ranked all the factors in identical order, with the exception that administrators ranked Marching Band above Community Perception Both groups ranked “Teacher Effectiveness” as the most important factor and “Contest Participation and Ratings” as the least. Comparisons between administrators\u27 and band directors\u27 ratings at the .006 level of significance using independent t-tests produced only one significant difference between ratings for “Caliber of the Marching Band.” Several significant relationships between selected demographic variables and the SIBPI factors were found and their implications discussed