We are proud to announce that our very own Director of El Sistema Josue Gonzalez has been awarded this year’s Arts Schools Network’s Emerging Leader Award! Mr. Gonzalez works hard every day at our school to make our music program an innovative and rewarding experience for our students, and we are so glad his efforts are being officially recognized. Below is the press release from the Arts School Network about the award and why Josue was chosen to win it:
On May 15, 2017, Josue Gonzalez, Director of El Sistema at Conservatory Lab Charter School, won the 2017 Dr. Denise Davis-Cotton Emerging Leader Award from the Arts Schools Network (ASN), the nation’s largest professional membership organization of specialized arts schools. The award is designed to recognize excellence and achievement among rising arts schools administrators and to highlight the educational innovation practices or programs of those leaders. The award will be presented at ASN’s annual conference Oct. 24-27, 2017, in Minneapolis, MN.
In his two years of being sole director of the El Sistema program, Josue has fostered strong bonds between Conservatory Lab and the community. Josue has grown relationships with prominent Boston-based musical organizations such as the Landmarks Orchestra, with whom Conservatory Lab performs every year in the summer, and the Pro Arte Chamber Orchestra. He has also helped to establish new connections between Conservatory Lab and the Boston Public Library, which has invited Josue’s school to perform at their main and local branches several times this year. Within Conservatory Lab Charter School, Josue has carefully shaped the El Sistema program to serve students more effectively. The school orchestras are structured to optimize practice time, better serve students with special needs, and improve student-teacher ratios in the classroom. Josue’s efforts to improve the school orchestras and enhance students’ musical learning have been acknowledged publicly at the Massachusetts State House, where his school performed a winter concert, and by the Mayor of Boston, who visited the school at the beginning of the year.
Josue Gonzalez started his musical studies at the age of four, while he was living in Puerto Rico. Growing up, he was a member of the Puerto Rico Philharmonic and studied at the Interlochen Arts Academy. He went on to attend the Cleveland Institute of Music, where he earned a BM in performance and an MM in Suzuki Pedagogy. In 2011, he came to work at Conservatory Lab Charter school, where he is currently the Director of El Sistema.
Dedicated to excellence and leadership in arts education, Arts Schools Network, a non-profit professional organization founded in 1981, is a dynamic resource for arts school leaders, innovative partners and members of arts education institutions. Its mission is to provide leaders in arts schools with quality resources, support, and networking opportunities. ASN has provided communications, programs, services, conferences and events to support these goals for over 30 years. Visit the website at www.artsschoolsnetwork.org to learn more.