California Institute of Integral Studies

Graduate Student, Transformative Studies

Thesis Title: The Recreation of Music Education: Redesigning elementary instrumental music education through participatory action research (WIP)

About

Basil Mundy Viar, III, is an educator and special administrator in the Mt. Diablo Unified School District, of Contra Costa County, California.  In this role, he discovered the need for a reevaluation of the roles, purposes, and directions of scholastic music in a changing community and in a changing economy.  The direction of his doctoral work is largely influenced by this experience, and he is researching alternatives to music training both inside and outside of the traditional school experience, with an eye on the roles that community based organizations may play in this.

Prior to his service in the public schools, Mr. Viar was a Program Director for the Blue Devils, an internationally revered youth organization dedicated to performance excellence, based in Concord, California.  During his time with the Blue Devils, the "B" Corps was reinvigorated and performed with renewed excitement, proficiency, and levels of success.  Under Mr. Viar's guidance, BDB performed in the 1997 Drum Corps International World Championships in Orlando, Florida, and the 1998 World Marching Band Festival in Kanagawa Prefecture Japan.

Basil Mundy Viar, III, is a PhD candidate in the Transformative Inquiry Department at the California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco, California.  He earned a Master of Arts degree in Education from the University of California, Berkeley; Single Subject Teaching Credential from the Bay Area College of Chapman University in Orange, California; and a Bachelor of Science degree from the School of Community and Public Affairs at Virginia Commonwealth University of Richmond, Virginia.

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