On March 11, Jason Prater, the artistic director of the Youth Choir San Diego stood before City Council, requesting a permanent home in El Cajon. Mayor Bill Wells, who has had prior conversations with him, wanted Prater to share his vision with the council.
On March 11, Jason Prater, the artistic director of the Youth Choir San Diego stood before City Council, requesting a permanent home in El Cajon. Mayor Bill Wells, who has had prior conversations with him, wanted Prater to share his vision with the council.
In just the few short minutes that Prater spoke, his passion about the youth in our community was impressionable. “Empowering San Diego’s youth, one note at a time,” is its concept along with developing important character traits in our local youth. Members of the choir have leeway in artistic direction, song choices and performances, giving them the ability to learn discipline, leadership and teamwork at a young age.
This group, along with many other programs that empower today’s youth are what this city needs. Music is a universal language, and Prater understands that in asking to bring this program into the valley. It can break long cultural barriers in this extremely diverse community. And to break them, it needs to begin with our children whom are our future.
With the East County Performing Arts Center opening up, and the many great venues from Grossmont College to our high school and middle school theaters, El Cajon has the space to educate our youth through the power of music.
Prater is more than prepared to tackle this project. He set forth a plan and has already targeted local schools with diverse populations to begin recruiting East County youth into the program. This is sorely needed in our community. What possibility it brings to our youth and community is priceless and immeasurable.
With school budgets still in utter chaos, the arts are nearly always the first to fall by the wayside. It has been the solidarity and persistence of the musical programs that thrive in East County today that keep them alive and well. Parents, teachers and students beat the streets, have fundraisers and pull money out of their own pockets in many cases just to keep these programs alive.
This will come back to the council in a couple of week, as Wells wanted council members to hear Prater’s idea and give it some thought before bringing it back for further discussion and possible action. It appeared that he was well received and it is my hope that each council member embraces this idea and pushes forward with it. There is no better investment to secure our future than empowering our youth.
To find out more about the Youth Choir San Diego, go to youthchoirsd.org.
In this multi-cultural city, which has had its problems in bridging that gap, this is as important a decision and can produce better fruit than any of the many regulations that El Cajon uses in reaction to what is going on around the city.
This is a great opportunity to be proactive. This might seem like small potatoes to some, but if the Youth Choir San Diego can perform its mantra as well as its music, then this “multi-racial, multi-ethnic and multi-cultural community youth choral organization shaping the future by developing and empowering young leaders through the avenue of musical excellence” needs community support, city financing and a place to call home.
