Greiner Middle School parent Rebecca Ordinario lives near Jesuit, but she drives her seventh-grader to school in Oak Cliff every day.
“Up here in North Dallas land, where I live, no one has heard of Greiner,” Ordinario says.
That’s a problem. Last year, DISD nearly closed Greiner’s Exploratory Arts Academy, which is known for its music program. Parents rallied to save it, but it is just funded. The academy’s budget includes teacher salaries and nothing else.
“There’s no budget for costumes, instruments … I don’t think the pianos have been tuned in years,” Ordinario says. “There’s just no money.”
Ordinario started thinking about how Booker T. Washington School for the Performing Arts is so successful. What is their “secret?” she wondered. So she met with the PTA president there and found that much of Booker T.’s fundraising and publicity is due to its advisory committee.
So Ordinario is putting together an advisory committee for Greiner. Goals for the committee are not in writing yet, but they will include fundraising, applying for grants, gaining publicity and securing public performances for Greiner Arts Academy students.
Two women have committed to serve on the board so far. One is an education lawyer who has experience with grant writing, and the other is Adrienne Jackson, a lawyer who is the wife of Sylvan|Thirty developer Brent Jackson.
Anyone interested in serving on the board should contact Ordinario: rordinario@me.com or 214.418.9043.
By the way, Ordinario’s son, Cameron, is the kid who last year was inspired to write the song “Please Save Greiner”:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O4ow_mtMl8U[/youtube]
