"It would be great to be able to change something in music teacher training"

Dr Annette Ziegenmeyer and the KulturCampus Wuppertal project

Her heart beats for the school where Dr Annette Ziegenmeyer happily taught for nine years. During this time, however, she also felt the constraints of this bureaucratic system, was soon critical of many decisions and was no longer able to realise many of her ideas there.

Born in Hildesheim, she had her sights set on teaching at a university or college from an early age. Her love of the French language and a dedicated music teacher, who gave exemplary inclusive music lessons at a time when the word was still unknown in schools, shaped the academic counsellor. She enthusiastically describes her approach: "She really inspired us all to make music and managed to get the whole year to take part in the so-called 'music weeks' over and above the lessons. In music lessons, I particularly remember her self-written arrangements, which sounded really good and in which each of us got our own individual part to play. It was particularly great that you learnt the notes "en passant"."

Close contact between school and university is important

She has been at the university of Wuppertal since 2015 and believes that close contact between the university and school is extremely important in this first phase of teacher training. "I wish that I could also teach a minimum amount at school as part of my university teaching (for example in the form of a working group). It would be ideal if something like this were even anchored in the individual job profiles in teacher training. Only those who know both institutions from the inside and, as a university lecturer in the field of teacher training, do not lose contact with the school as a place of learning, can think about both levels together. I believe that I fulfil this requirement to a certain extent by maintaining very intensive contact with music teachers at various schools and regularly carrying out school projects with our students, and I see this as a strength."

Music is simply something that binds us all together here.

However, her strength lies not only in her work as a teacher, but also in her artistic orientation. Recorder player and composer Annette Ziegenmeyer is primarily concerned with music education in which music is the unifying element and creativity has its place. It is therefore not surprising that the projects she has already initiated in Wuppertal aim to encourage student teachers to realise their individual interests and strengths. This is also how her favourite project, the KulturCampus Wuppertal, a service learning project in music education, came about.

Service learning project: KulturCampus Wuppertal

In May 2016, she met the freelance musician and music educator Björn Krüger (Uncle Ho; Planet K - Kultur für alle e.V.) through the Wuppertal Cultural Office. It was a momentous encounter, which allowed the joint KulturCampus Wuppertal project to really take off. Before the KulturCampus Wuppertal could really take off from the 2016/17 winter semester, Ziegenmeyer and Krüger first held talks with the university management and received positive support. They also obtained funding from the Jackstädt Foundation and FABU.

So what exactly happens at the KulturCampus Wuppertal?

In a compulsory elective module, students at the University of Wuppertal gain an insight into fields of work in music culture and acquire the necessary skills (project conception and project design, search for sponsors, application, cost calculation, networking, etc.).

The students then develop their own idea for a music-cultural project - music-cultural, music-educational or artistically orientated - and then carry it out themselves. An examination consisting of written project documentation as well as a presentation and colloquium round off the module and lead to the "KulturCampus Wuppertal: Project work in cultural education" certificate.

"The KulturCampus Wuppertal unfolds its effect precisely at the point where the tensions between artistic, pedagogical and scientific development processes become visible for students on teacher training programmes in music. It represents a useful and necessary enrichment for students with a clear career goal of becoming a music teacher as well as for those who are not sure about this or who realise during their studies that they do not want to work in schools after all," says Ziegenmeyer about her project. "Music teachers in particular can benefit from competences in music-cultural work. By participating in KulturCampus Wuppertal, they are sensitised to individual scope for action in music-cultural project work, which they can then use effectively and sustainably later in their professional lives on the basis of the knowledge and experience they have acquired (e.g. in the form of collaborations with artists, purchasing instruments). On the other hand, the networking of stakeholders in cultural life that the KulturCampus aims to achieve creates a win-win-win situation in which both the university, the city of Wuppertal and the field of music-cultural education benefit."

Finally, Ziegenmeyer adds that the emerging cultural programmes will be made visible on the KulturCampus Wuppertal website so that it can also function as a kind of database in the future.

Hospice concerts and an environmental music education project

Two projects have already developed remarkably. One is the project "Zusammen Weinen - Zusammen Lachen e.V." by student Jens Reddmann, which uses music to care for children living in a hospice facility. Reddmann offers so-called "living room concerts" in which everyone can participate according to their abilities. The project has already met with such a great response that other institutions have enquired and workshops are also being planned.

In another project, student Lea Sander organised a month-long music project at a school on the island of Pulau Mabul in Malaysia. The aim was to educate the children about the consequences of plastic waste pollution in the oceans through a creative approach to music. During their month-long stay on the island, they not only created many songs, but also a 30-minute show, which was performed in the village at the end. In addition, Lea Sander has decided that she will return to Malaysia after completing her bachelor's degree to do volunteer work in schools as part of the non-profit organisation T.R.Y. to supervise volunteer work at the schools.

And what's next?

The tireless music teacher and composer is already pursuing her next project, which was inspired by reading an article about composing as a therapeutic tool for prisoners. "You could, for example, offer prisoners in juvenile detention centres an opportunity to deal creatively with their past, in a positive sense as an alternative to violence. People need to realise that there are people there who also have a history. Bad situations and conflicts have always been resolved through music. I believe that a lot of good can come out of a creative dialogue with music and one's own life, if you can shout it out and say: I experienced that."

Uwe Blass (interview from 09/08/2017)

As part of the Ü-55 Research Days, Dr Ziegenmeyer will be speaking together with Björn Krüger, Lea I. Sander and Jens Reddmann on Thursday, 14 September at 1.15 pm, course 15, on the topic: KulturCampus Wuppertal - Dein Kulturprojekt: Planen - Entwerfen - Durchführen. Free registration at www.wuppertal-live.de

Annette Ziegenmeyer, 1996-2001 studied "School Music" at the Hanover University of Music, Drama and Media and at the Leibniz University of Hanover (second subject: French), 2001-2002 postgraduate studies in "Music Education" and 2002-2003 postgraduate studies in "Artistic Education" at the Hanover University of Music, Drama and Media, 2003-2005 stay in Paris as part of an artist and composer scholarship at the Cité Internationale des Arts (Ministry of Science and Culture of Lower Saxony), subsequent teaching at the Conservatoire municipal de musique de Malakoff (Paris), 2006-2008 traineeship, 2008-2012 doctoral studies in musicology at the Cologne University of Music and Dance, 2008-2015 work as a teacher at the Stormarnschule in Ahrensburg, 2013-2015 secondment as a research assistant for music didactics/pedagogy at the European University of Flensburg, since 2015 academic counsellor at the university of Wuppertal.

The KulturCampus Wuppertal can be found at the following link: http: //kulturcampus-wuppertal.de/