Music for Togetherness

Music teaches us to exist collectively, be creative, pay attention for other people's emotions, express ourselves and adapt. Most underprivileged kids lack the self-trust they need to face our contemporary challenges. We want to develop an app that will teach them music alongside humane values, combining technical and emotional skills.

Music for Togetherness is an education project that aims to build an app that will support music teachers and students in both non-profit youth projects and public schools, in underprivileged communities of Ceara (BR). Besides offering music learning activities for various instruments, the app will propose dynamics regarding themes such as conflict mediation, collaboration, bullying, identity, personal development, family relations, gender equality, work perspectives and others, all in Portuguese. It will also offer a possibility for peer-to-peer learning dynamics, stimulating youth protagonism.

The methodology is based on the work that has been done by Instituto Beatriz e Lauro Fiuza (IBLF) for the past five years, which combines both a rigorous music curriculum and an attentive social monitoring work with the kids and their families, counting on a team of psychologists, social workers and pedagogues. The app will make it possible for more teachers and students to benefit from the program, bringing the cost per student down, therefore making it possible for non-profits and schools to welcome more kids. It combines music theory and practice, group dynamics based on biocentric pedagogy and Paulo Freire, student based content and parent engagement, all of which has already been tested with 400 students from three different communities of Fortaleza - Ceara.

Through the program kids will develop the ability to handle challenges, to adapt to new knowledge, to engage with creative groups and to become responsible for their achievements. Teachers will have support to develop human development related activities. The skills developed here are basic and crucial for any individual looking for a place in the 21st century work force.

If scaled, this program can help teachers and kids get through difficult concepts and life lessons with structure, understanding what is important for a balanced life, learning through engagement and music.

Fortaleza is a city in Northeast Brazil with a population of 3 million people, dozens of neglected communities and consequently very high levels of criminality and social inequality. Despite government attempts, the education system fails to build a sense of community and collective growth with the kids and their families, and the absence of hope in impoverished homes has made many stop making the effort to build a better reality for themselves and escape the poverty cycle. Violence is a part of both communities and family homes. Drug trafficking, consumption and alcoholism are gaining more space day by day. 

We have understood that education is the only way to reduce the high rates of violence, early pregnancies, school dropouts and informal underpaid jobs. However, it isn't through learning how to do a specific job that we will solve the lack of hope towards the future. It is instead by helping kids see their own creative potential, through a more holistic approach that puts human development first. It's through letting them see they are able of achieving excellence through their own efforts, as they learn new skills. Along with strengthening family bonds and sense of collective purpose.

Through this app we will be able to have a positive impact on the lives of thousands of children, adolescents and their families. We aim to empower the youth to become leaders in their communities, taking their values and music beyond their learning centers, for music is an universal language that benefits not only those who play but also those who contemplate, being a strong connector of people and ideas. We will first deploy the app on our non-profit partners in Ceara, testing it. Then expand to other non-profits, then schools, and then other states in Brazil. 

Close followup through the Symphony of Tomorrow Platform, with preparation sessions for the teachers. - 20 projects and schools implement the methodology in the first year

Implementation of an evaluation system in the projects and schools (already existing). - Kids outcome in school improves and dropout rates decrease.

Track download on the app store. - 3000 people in Ceara download our app and use it.

There are plenty of apps for music learning online, but very few in Portuguese and none that combines music and human development. Our solution targets a part of the population that will be able to thrive through music learning, not only profiting from a new technical skill (for as musicians they already open a door into the workforce) but also gaining deeper social-emotional skills that will be useful in every aspect of their lives. The lessons will be taught through gaming, with escalating exercises and group dynamics, and videos will be posted by the students themselves, stimulating peer-to-peer learning.

Everything about this app is based on the experience we have with underprivileged kids in Ceara. The methodology was built upon experience, and we work together with 21 other projects to have a wide perception of kids and teachers realities and needs in different localities. The projects main partners are the Symphony of Tomorrow Platform, a network of 22 music education projects that reach 7000 students; the University of Fortaleza (Psychology School and Graduate School of Law); and the Federal University of Ceara (Music and Education Schools). Different players of society united to find solutions for our kids’ challenges.

We hope to be able to offer the app on both ios and android app stores for free, for tables and phones, making it useful for classrooms and individual use alike. Most underprivileged families have access to a smartphone today, but we want to make it so that part of the content can be accessed offline, for wifi is still a problem. We now wish to partner up with both app developers and internet providing companies, to make it all possible. 

We have been working on the methodology for 5 years, implementing it in our three learning units, in Fortaleza. Today we have 400 students learning, in various instruments, but we have already reached at least twice that number, and thousands of people if we include the family members we have impacted. We have strong sponsors for all the teaching, publishing, performance and exchange projects, that will allow of ground team to keep doing what we do. The app we propose here, however, will only become a reality if we find the needed developing partners and the financial resources to build it and test the pilot with our partner projects. And that will allow us to scale the impact of what we have built so far, and get to thousands of kids who truly need help. 

In order for this solution to succeed, we need strong developing partners that are able to translate our methodology into code. Also, we will need partners to help us bring wifi to all the projects and schools who will be our partners during the pilot phase, and tablets for all the teachers who will test the app in class. We will also need creative partners to turn our lessons and exercises into images and games, translating what our team does in person, in the classroom, into something that can be brought to all kids, with or without instruments at home. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7hut1WyxNwQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7uLxfcBqkTg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dW5zW7ah1kE

Although we’ve come very far since we started, bringing social change to thousands of lives during the past five years, we feel we can do much more with the right partnerships and with technology’s help. We believe that being Solvers will get us support from research facilities, developers and investors, which we need to reach thousands more lives. We know there are initiatives around the world from which we can learn, and hope to have access to them through Solve. Our dream is to develop the best possible product to have a true effect on young Brazilians lives.

The Symphony of Tomorrow Platform, University of Fortaleza and Federal University of Ceara. IBLF also finds support in the Ministry of Culture, the Ceara Department of Culture, the companies GERA, ENEL, Vivo and Clóvis Mapurunga Advogados. As institutional partners: Fundação Carlos Pinheiro, Casa José de Alencar and Quitanda das Artes.

We believe we have no true competitors. Anyone interested in developing this project is our ally.