Arrival Information for Tomorrow

I know you are all waiting for a new singer post, but unfortunately it's just us here in the office, sharing a reminder that singers will be arriving tomorrow on British Airways flight 215, which is scheduled to arrive in Boston at 7:15 PM local time. They will be arriving at the International Terminal E. Start cooking those favorite American meals!

Also, we'd like to share the following press release from Teach First, a non-profit organization that we collaborated with to do a workshop at Uxbridge High School in England. Here's a link to their press release about the event. Check out its title!

What We're Up To: TOUR!!!

This is the last blog post you will read before our Premier Choir and Young Men's Ensemble singers take over the blog entirely for about two weeks with their pictures, news and musings from tour. Tonight, 59 singers and 12 adults will board a British Airways flight to the United Kingdom for BCC's 4^th international cultural exchange tour. The itinerary is available on our website. We hope you will support our community by following along on the journey! There are 3 ways you can do that: 

1. Read our blog (you're one step ahead - keep it up!). A different singer will post to the blog each day! They will be excited to share their photos and thoughts on their day, and how it relates to their experience at BCC as a whole. We encourage you to comment on their postings - it's the best way of communicating with them while they are away. 
2. Follow us on Twitter.  For all you tweeps, our handle is @BCChorus. Please use the hashtag #BCCtour for your tweets! If you're not on Twitter yet, it might be a good time to get "attwicted!"
3. Find us on Facebook. We hope you will visit our page before the end of the tour on July 8th. During the tour, we are trying to raise the equivalent of one student's scholarship for the trip. You can find information about that Fundraising Project on our page, on the Support BCC tab. If a financial contribution is not possible at this time, we hope you will Join Our Cause, and share the information with your network of Facebook friends.

Thank you for the rich and vibrant community you've helped us to create here at BCC. We look forward to growing our reputation around the world with your support!

What BCC Means to Me - One Part of My Normal Life

By: Precious Perez, Central Intermediate

Precious has been in BCC for two years.  She is 13 years old.

It was a Thursday rehearsal when I presented a video of a day in my life with a visual impairment to Central Intermediate.  I was quite nervous, unsure of whether or not it would be beneficial, or would make a difference in the way the rest of the choir thought of me.

My video presentation entitled Precious Perez: A Day In the Life contained scenes of walking outside using my cane, adapted card games, and other significant and valuable information that would guide the rest of the choir and staff to better understand my disability, capability, and accommodations which allow me to live a perfectly normal and regular life.  Everyone was welcoming and honest, and I felt that my goal was achieved, that my goal of feeling that I am part of the choir as opposed to feeling special or different, which I am not.

All I am is visually impaired, and all that means is that my eyes do not work, but that does not keep me from doing the things that everyone else does and more, and as this presentation and its outcome show, all everyone needs is a little bit of education to surpass the assumption and misconception, and to expand their horizons with truth and reality.

Editor's Note: Because of technical problems, we are not able to share Precious' video presentation here, as she would have liked. However, we do have some footage of the follow-up Q&A that she had with her fellow singers.

What We're Up To: Building a Mentorship Program

One of the things that we see an opportunity to improve at BCC is the mentoring aspect of our youth development program. We hope that our readers know that we do A LOT more than sing here at BCC – if you need a reminder of what our mission is exactly, check it out on our website.

Edward Clapp

Over the summer, we are going to be working with Harvard Doctoral candidate Edward Clapp to launch an Omni-Directional Mentorship program (more on what that means later). It will be active starting at the beginning of next season. Over the past few months, Clapp has held one-on-one conversations with singers, parents, staff, and board members about how we relate to one another at BCC and how we can improve our interactions. He presented his initial findings this week in a discussion-oriented session at BCC Central, open to the same broad range of people.

He pointed out that when we typically think about mentorship, we imagine a top-down relationship (i.e. from a more experienced person to a less-experienced person). Omni-directional membership is different because it considers other directions, like bottom-up and lateral (i.e. peer) relationships. An organization that effectively uses omni-directional membership creates a web of learning, where “all leaders are learners, and all learners are leaders.”

Clapp presents his thoughts on the
points of "resonance"
and "dissonance" at BCC

In developing this program with BCC, Clapp is using a very appropriate metaphor – the voice! He asked attendees to think about how they “hear voice” and “have voice” within the organization, as well as the areas in which the very broad BCC community has “resonance” (i.e. agreement) and “dissonance” (i.e. disagreement). The greater the resonance within the organization, the more likely we are to have “harmony,” which Clapp defined as a powerful expression of the mission, vision, and/or purpose of the organization.

Singers, parents, staff
and board offered ideas.

The group in attendance talked about a lot of ways that we could foster relationships within and across stakeholder groups. Singers expressed a strong interest in getting to know the board, newer parents wanted an opportunity to interact with older parents, parents were interested in experiencing what singers are learning in rehearsal.

However the program takes shape this fall, all of us can count on being asked to be involved, including our audience, funders, and alumni! Clapp is intent on enhancing our community through knowledge sharing and “curiosity about the other.” We hope you’ll come along with us on this journey, because our community has something to learn from your voice!

Why not start Getting Vocal now? Leave a comment about your role in BCC’s community, the ways you would like to see it grow or change, and your suggestions about how we should get there! If you are reading this post on our website, please visit the blog at bostonchildrenschorus.blogspot.com to make your comment. Thanks!