Birmingham woman uses retirement money to start music program fo - ABC 33/40 - Birmingham News, Weather, Sports
Member Center:
How much would you give to see your dream come true? Your time or talent? What about your retirement account? One Birmingham woman cashed in her account to bring music to children.
The program is called Scrollworks.
Two 207 children enrolled for the summer program. It's maintained by a lot of volunteer hours. And a lot of donations. But it all started with one woman who was willing to give.
"My entire family thinks I'm insane," Jeane Goforth, founder of Birmingham's Scrollworks.
She is glad she listened to her heart instead of her family. Because when she listened closely, this is what she heard. Children learning how to play orchestral music.
"I took my retirement savings and we started the Scrollworks program," she said.
This engineer turned nonprofit CEO, was inspired after seeing her daughter flourish as a musician.
"Music changed her life. She just got her masters in cello performance. And I realized that a lot of children weren't getting that experience," she said.
She had that epiphany in 2008. This is what Scrollworks looks like today.
"My goal is to one day become a professional violinist and to one day join a symphony orchestra,"said Alia Muhammad.
Muhammad and her two sisters are Scrollworks students. Each week, they attend lessons free of charge. The instruments? loaned for free as well. The confidence the Muhammad sisters have gained? Their father says that's priceless.
"If they can accomplish music, it gives them the confidence to conquer anything else that's put before them," said Tracey Muhammad.
Across the hall. A similar story.
"My goal is to make people love orchestral music," said Goforth.
Kaitlyn Esman, her twin sister Isabella, and their friend Brady love the program, and Ms. Goforth, who hopes Scrollworks is just the beginning.
"The real focus is on getting the kids in the orchestra. It's the metropolitan youth orchestra and that's our top level orchestra," she said.
Registration for the fall starts August 1st. The highlands united Methodist church allows Scrollworks to operate out of the church building free of charge.
As for those volunteer instructors, many are members of the Alabama symphony orchestra.
Gorforth relies heavily on donations. She's always looking for people with used instruments. For more information on how you can donate, go to scrollworks.org.
 | 
|
