Oberlin College Awarded $150,000 Grant to Strengthen Music Studies Major

The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has awarded Oberlin College a $150,000 presidential leadership grant, which will be used to strengthen and expand the study of music in the context of liberal arts, a priority identified by President Marvin Krislov.

“I am thrilled that the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has provided me with this grant and the capacity to develop opportunities to incorporate musical study across the Arts and Sciences curriculum,” Krislov says. “It will it be a tremendous asset in helping the college reach a new level of inclusive academic, artistic, and musical excellence and in helping us in our continued goal of preparing college and conservatory students for successful lives, careers, and leadership.”

Building connections across the curriculum through interdisciplinary study and ties between the College of Arts and Sciences and the Conservatory of Music is a key focus of the Oberlin College Strategic Plan 2016-2021. With this grant, over the next four years Oberlin College will:

• enhance and expand the study of music in the context of the liberal arts through piloting of a full-time faculty line in Musical Studies designed to increase the number and diversity of course offerings;

• offer faculty-development workshops and competitive curriculum-development grants to broaden faculty expertise to incorporate musical study across the Arts and Sciences curriculum; and

• develop programming to deepen student and faculty engagement with music.

“Premised on the culture of academic and artistic vibrancy that flows naturally from Oberlin’s college-conservatory combination, this grant empowers us not only to create new opportunities for students to enrich their learning through musical engagement,” says Dean of the Conservatory of Music Andrea Kalyn, “but also to make connections across disciplines through music, and to contextualize the many performances on campus with their core academic work and co-curricular interests. We are deeply grateful to the Mellon Foundation for supporting us in this endeavor.”

About the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation

Founded in 1969, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation endeavors to strengthen, promote, and, where necessary, defend the contributions of the humanities and the arts to human flourishing and to the well-being of diverse and democratic societies by supporting exemplary institutions of higher education and culture as they renew and provide access to an invaluable heritage of ambitious, path-breaking work. Additional information is available at mellon.org.