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Jane McKinney says her career has been driven by a love of music and the process of teaching, sharing, and guiding young people into music’s power just as she was guided by many wonderful mentors.

“Some may disagree, but I think music is the expression of our souls,” said McKinney, who was chairwoman of the music department at Greensboro College from 1992 until 2008.

She previously was the band director at Rockingham County Senior High School, where she remained for eight and a half years.  

A native of Greensboro, McKinney was a 1970 graduate of Smith High School and received her doctorate in music education from UNCG.

 Music has always been a part of McKinney’s life. Her mother, Dorothy Hayworth Grant of Greensboro, was a singer, and both grandmothers were pianists. Her brother and uncle played trumpet.

Her mother’s side of the family is Moravian, and from an early age, she was expected to play in the bands and sing in the choirs.

After receiving her masters degree, she received three job offers, but her trusted professor and mentor, Ray Gariglio, gave her sound advice about starting her career in teaching music.

“It is better that a first-year instructor not follow in the footsteps of a seasoned band director.”

McKinney took his advice and took the job as the first band director at Rockingham County Senior High School.

At Rockingham, she also met her future husband, Charles McKinney, a physics and physical science teacher and track coach.

Their 15-year-old son, Justin, attends Weaver Academy in Greensboro.

There was a push in the ’80s from several major university music programs to gather historical research in music education from the 50 states. McKinney took on the challenge.

Her doctoral dissertation focused on three women in the UNCG music faculty who were pioneers in developing public school and college music programs spanning the years 1917-1965.

McKinney was surprised and honored when the Council of Research in Music Education designated her work as the most outstanding dissertation in the nation.

While completing her doctoral dissertation in 1988, she served as a part-time instructor at Greensboro College — teaching, conducting and directing the jazz ensemble.

She took the full-time music position vacated by the late Fred Beyer in 1989.

McKinney recalls that Greensboro College had undergone difficult times in the early ’80s and had reduced the music department to two faculty positions and dropped its accreditation by the National Association of Schools of Music.

By 1989, McKinney recalls, it was sad to see Odell Hall quiet with only three students majoring in music.

With her experience , McKinney felt she could help rebuild the music program at Greensboro College.

 McKinney’s mentor, Gariglio, believed that to have a strong  program, great teachers needed to “do their own thing” in developing students.

For the most part, that’s the approach McKinney and Henry Ingram took.

McKinney chose as her goal securing the NASM accreditation that had been lost.

She knew regaining the accreditation would strengthen the program as a competitor among small-college music programs and affect enrollment positively.

Greensboro College once again became a full member of NASM in 2007.

The college’s greatest enrollment growth musically has come with the band program, McKinney said.

In 2009, Jon Brotherton, director of choral activities, assumed the role of head of the music department. Mc­Kinney has returned to her first love — teaching.

“Greensboro College fills the niche of students who want to attend a small college and play in concert and marching bands,” McKinney said.

Currently Greensboro College has 54 music majors, a healthy number for a small-college program, along with music minors and students of other majors participating in ensembles and classes.

McKinney is proud of Greensboro College’s alums and said they are the best cheerleaders of the college.

Four recent graduates are making careers in military bands, one of whom plays guitar in the Air Force Blue Aces.

Last spring a 1996 graduate, Aaron Noe, brought his high school concert band and jazz ensemble to the college. McKinney is pleased that Noe has developed into an outstanding band director and wants to pursue college teaching.

Many of McKinney’s music graduates now provide service to churches as singers, organists, pianist, also in praise and worship bands.

While in training, music majors are encouraged to assist in church music programs.