2024-25 ACG Education Report: Transforming Lives
The 25-26 school year is underway. ACG is investing a million dollars in our education services this year. As you’ll read in the report below, ACG Education enriches the lives of thousands of young people and families in communities near and far. If you are inspired by this work we hope you will consider making a gift as part of our Fall Fund Drive. Click here to donate.
Dear Friends of ACG Education,
It is a joy to share this education report with you. For more than two decades, ACG has brought inspiration and artistry to students and teachers across Austin, the US, and beyond. This year, we supported a record number of students and teachers – building new guitar education communities. We created deep and meaningful project-based experiences for young guitarists working alongside some of the most accomplished artists in the world. In this report you’ll find stories, new data, and reflections of the work. What connects it all is the powerful truth we see each day: ACG Education transforms lives.
I am beyond grateful to you, our supporters, who helped us invest over $1 million into this work this year, and to the educators, students, and partners, who carry it out with passion and dedication each day near and far.
Together, we are building pathways to a more kind and beautiful world.
Travis Marcum PhD
Carol Jean Mosher Knupp Director of Education
Austin & Central Texas Impact
How this transforms lives: Our deepest work happens here, thousands of hours a year, making sure our teachers succeed even if they’re new, giving free lessons and guitars for kids in need, and making uniquely motivating projects and unforgettable memories. In addition to friendship, joy, identity, and expression, data shows our students are doing better in school. The impact of our programs is significant: there are now more students in Austin ISD middle and high schools enrolled in guitar than there are in orchestra or choir.
Our central Texas education services focused on Austin, Manor, Hutto, San Marcos, and juvenile justice centers in Travis and Williamson counties.
In a 2025 study of over 1,000 guitar students in our 14 Title 1 schools, AISD data shows that guitar students had improved STAAR test and End-Of-Course exam scores in all subject areas, as well as reduced behavioral referrals than their non-guitarist peers when matched by campus and demographic. This continues the same trend from a similar 2024 study.
How do we achieve these results? We help young people discover their voices, build confidence, and create community through the guitar. We accomplish this by a deep dedication to our research-based methodology called the Five Elements:
Belonging – Personal Responsibility – Perseverance – Performance – Celebration
This guiding philosophy helps ensure that every individual that picks up a guitar with us – everyone who offers their time, efforts, and creativity walks away from an ACG experience with a sense of accomplishment, with community, and a feeling of deep personal significance. We believe this translates into success and confidence in other areas of life.
Special thanks to W.D. Kelley Foundation, Applied Materials Foundation, and Burdine Johnson Foundation for helping make possible our work in Hutto/Williamson County, Manor, and San Marcos, respectively.
Teaching Artistry
How this transforms lives: Our Teaching Artist team makes a huge impact on area students. In many cases they, themselves, are former ACG students as well. Much is written about Austin’s affordability challenges for working musicians and we are proud to be a secure and significant source of revenue for our teaching, healing, and performing artists, as well as our full time staff.
In 2024-25 ACG invested close to $100,000 in our contract teaching artists, providing both vital support for our students and a significant source of income for local artists. This work doesn’t just nurture today’s learners, it helps sustain our city’s creative community.
Some of our most inspiring stories involve former students returning to join the team as Teaching Artists. Rey Rodriguez, once a student at Crockett High School and Francisco De La Rosa from Akins High School are recent examples. Both began their journeys as students in ACG classrooms, and today they are leading the next generation of young guitarists, continuing the cycle of mentorship and inspiration. Read more about Rey and Francisco.
Student Success Spotlight: Eric Xavier Briones
How this transforms lives: Individual attention makes all the difference. While some families can afford private instruction and instruments, many cannot. For 24 years we’ve provided free lessons to support students and teachers. Decades of success stories of our scholarship recipients prove the transformative, long-lasting impact of this investment.
Over 50 promising young Title 1 school students qualified for intensive, weekly, individual lessons through our free lessons program in 2024-25. Here’s one story.
As a high school senior Eric Xavier Briones had a clear vision: he wanted music to make the world better with music. He just needed some help getting there. Eric applied for and won our Javier Niño Scholarship, and was paired with ACG Teaching Artist Evan Taucher. By the spring Eric’s next goal was clear: go to the University of Miami to study guitar and music therapy. While this goal was lofty, so was the passion and dedication with which he approached every moment. It takes a village, and through ACG mentors, teachers, advisors, and donors, he had the support he needed to make his dreams come true. He has just started his first semester at the University of Miami and is loving every minute of it.
Of special significance is Eric’s volunteerism. When he read an ACG newsletter about our work in the Juvenile Justice System, he asked if he could join that program as a peer mentor. He dedicated himself to the work and made a huge impact on students in our long-term engagement program (see below). Read more about Xavier, his vision for music and human healing.
Special thanks to The Long Foundation, Webber Family Foundation, and Ameriprise for helping make this work possible.
GuitarCurriculum
How this transforms lives: Originally published in 2008, this first-of-its-kind flagship resource is used by teachers internationally. In 2000 America had orchestra, choir, and band in schools but not guitar. Guitar programs are now engaging tens of thousands of students everyday, and ACG’s GuitarCurriculum is the curricular infrastructure at the center of that development.
After ten months of planning and development, we launched the new GuitarCurriculum.com in February. The new site is sleeker, more organized, and is supported by more current applications. The development process allowed us to reimagine how we wanted teachers to interact with the site and implement new approaches and materials, including the first-ever Student Portal. This new site launch, with its data management and marketing capabilities, is necessary to support our efforts to scale ACG Education.
GuitarCurriculum Method Books
How this transforms lives: Thousands of ACG method books are already in circulation after just two years since we introduced them. These resources are providing teachers with clear and concise pathways to rapid success in the classroom.
The impact and demand for our Level 1-4 Method Book inspired us to work on a sequential Method Book that covered the upper levels of our curriculum. The Level 5-8 Teacher Method Book was released in July, 2025, and includes 9 newly composed pieces that give access to new techniques (slurs, arpeggios) and upper position reading/literacy. The careful attention to sequencing allows these new goals to be accessible by a larger range of student experiences. The companion student edition, released in August, will be on music stands in front of learners all across the country, and will include access to materials on the Student Portal through QR codes.
Concert and Sight Reading
How this transforms lives: Concert and Sightreading events provide a focal point for students and instructors, set standards for quality education, and give administrators data by which to evaluate their instructors. This is a crucial step to maintain high quality instruction in the context of out statewide scaling efforts.
ACG’s Education team has been developing and supporting Guitar Concert and Sight Reading programs across the state of Texas for over 10 years. These events give students and directors an opportunity to prepare and perform for an adjudicated performance and sight reading. This past school year, the team furthered their engagement by developing new materials to support contest organizers and directors, and by providing in person support to events in Austin, Brownsville, Edinburg, Houston, El Paso and Denton. Our team witnessed accomplished smiles on the faces of almost 100 performing groups from across the state.
State and National Engagement
How this transforms lives: When we travel across the nation giving talks and training teachers more educators learn of the benefits of and methodology for high quality guitar education. Over time this will result in many thousands more young Americans finding joy and meaning in school through arts engagement.
In October, 2024, we had an opportunity to meet with Fine Arts directors from across the State of Texas at the annual Texas Fine Arts Administrators conference in Austin. In January we led professional development for the guitar teachers in Brownsville ISD, a community rich in the arts and talented educators.
We’ve deepened our connection to the South Carolina community across two visits. In February, Phil Swasey presented at the South Carolina Music Educators Association annual conference, and in July our education team returned for the 3rd year of our South Carolina Teacher Summit, where we worked with over 20 amazing educators from across the country.
In June, Travis Marcum, Joe Williams, and Matt Hinsley gave lectures about community centered art making at the Guitar Foundation of America International Convention in Louisville, Kentucky. Tony Mariano and Phil Swasey traveled to Oklahoma City in July to speak at the annual Leyenda Foundation’s “Come Together Conference”, a gathering of guitar educators from across the country.
At our National Teacher Summit in July in Austin, we convened a special Leadership Summit with strategic partners from New York, Ohio, Georgia, Texas, and California.
National Teacher Summit
How this transforms lives: Our flagship training event each year attracts teachers from across the US and beyond. Since 2009 this annual training event has been our most direct method of preparing teachers for success, sharing not only our curriculum sequencing, but also our research-based teaching philosophy.
Our 2025 Teacher Summit attracted nearly 50 teachers for 16 immersive hours of training alongside community-building activities, a strategic leadership retreat, and a world-class flamenco concert. Following this year’s summit on trainee, Art Gomez from El Paso wrote:
“I just wanted to express my gratitude to every single one of you for the most amazing professional experience I have ever had in my life. I can only imagine how much time, planning and let’s face it, money went into putting it together. Just know that it is valued very much. We thought we were going to a Guitar Summit which would be professional development, never did I expect that it would be more like “spiritual” development. It was the most informative, motivating and fun training I have ever had. I have been using Guitar Curriculum for over 10 years but not until I met with you all in person were my eyes truly opened to ACG’s philosophy, and I immediately knew I wanted to be part of it. We may be over 550 miles across the state, but I see that as a good thing. That way we may help to spread that philosophy across El Paso and perhaps beyond.”
Special thanks to the Augustine Foundation, Meadows Foundation, Cain Foundation, Kaman Foundation, and The Rea Charitable Trust for their transformative support for GuitarCurriculum developments, state and national advocacy, and our services for communities in need.
Global Services
How this transforms lives: When we encounter motivated and talented leaders in areas of great need we invest time, money and materials to enable them to create sustainable engines for joy and togetherness in music for their community.
M-LISADA organization in Uganda is an orphanage system that places great value on music and dance for their community. To date, ACG has provided 45 guitars and footstools, along with hundreds of replacement strings, as well as extensive remote teacher training. The results have been astonishing.
Ravindra Paudyal in Kathmandu, Nepal has been leading an extraordinary program for youth in his city. ACG supports this work with curriculum and financing when possible. Regular performance videos show extraordinary progress and a high standard.
Juvenile Justice Services
How this transforms lives: ACG built the first and only for-credit daily performing arts course for incarcerated youth in Texas history. Music in juvenile detention is a lifeline of friendship, trust, and community surrounding an activity rooted in beauty and self-expression that has the potential to alter the personal narrative for some of our most vulnerable youth.
In 2024-25 ACG Juvenile Justice Services served over 30 students in Austin’s Juvenile Justice Alternative Education Program, and Gardner Betts Facilities, our new ACG Long-term Engagement Program, Williamson County Juvenile Services, and Dallas County’s Henry Wade and Medlock facilities. The programs delivered meaningful, sustained music-making experiences offering consistency, creativity, and a sense of accomplishment in environments where those things can feel out of reach.
Our Long-term Engagement Program completed its first full year serving court-involved youth in the community. Six students participated, coming together for regular group instruction, and forming the Vita Ensemble which performed several times throughout the year. One ensemble member prepared for UIL Solo & Ensemble for the first time–his hard work was rewarded with a rating of ‘excellent’ – a huge accomplishment for someone who had never imagined himself in that setting. Another member of the group gave his very first presentation as a young artist, sharing both his story and his music in front of an audience. These moments – students taking risks, finding success, and even being recognized with their first paid performances – show what’s possible when they are given the space and trust to grow into their roles as artists.
Another unforgettable moment came during the JJAEP group’s first-ever offsite performance at The Rosette. One student, who had been visibly nervous, stepped onto the stage with hesitation. But as soon as he played that first note, everything shifted – he smiled, and it was as if all the nerves melted away. The entire group, who at first seemed indifferent – like they were just going through the motions – transformed before our eyes. They played with pride, and their smiles at the end were genuine and full. Seeing them celebrated in a space that recognized their artistry rather than their circumstances was deeply moving.
In Dallas, the program has continued to grow under the leadership of Dr. Noe Garcia. We now have three active groups there, and the trust and relationships being built week after week are remarkable. We were also able to welcome a new student into the program through a referral from a probation officer, marking the first Post Engagement referral in that area. That student has since been awarded his own instrument – a small but powerful reminder of how one “yes” can create a turning point in a young person’s life.
Special Thanks to the W.D Kelley Foundation, Wright Family Foundation, Texas Bar, Mockingbird Foundation, and FInd Your Light Foundation for supporting this significant work.
Community Ensembles: Celebrating 25 Years
How this transforms lives: making music should be a lifelong activity full of joy and connection. The years-long relationships we’ve built in the last quarter-century making music with our community have resulted in friendship, collaboration, and countless memories.
The 2024-2025 Season marked ACG Community Ensembles’ 25th year. The program grew from four to six ensembles this year adding the ACG Youth Sinfonia and the South Austin Guitar Ensemble (SAGE). In the coming year, we will introduce a seventh ensemble, ACG Youth Prelude, created especially for elementary-aged artists beginning their journey of growth, connection, and joyful music-making together.
To celebrate 25 years of community music-making, ACG commissioned nationally renowned and wildly inventive composer Graham Reynolds to write a multi-movement guitar ensemble work entitled Superheroes. This ambitious and exciting composition draws inspiration from four legendary superheroes, Powerman, Storm, Scarlet Witch, and Rocket Raccoon, and culminates in the finale Together We Will Save the Universe. The joy we experienced the night of the premiere together was deep and profound, and the memories will remain with those community artists for a long time.
Special thanks to Richard Linklater & Detour Filmproduction and Karrie & Tim League for their generous support of our 25th Anniversary Commission of Graham Reynolds’ Superheroes.
Turner Roberts Community Center
How this transforms lives: Families across Austin, especially in the eastern corridor often have difficulty finding free or affordable engagement opportunities for elementary-aged students after school while parents are still working. Successful artistic and expressive experiences for these students provides a catalyst to creativity, highlighting the value of their voice and laying a pathway for guitar engagement at the middle and high school levels.
In Spring 2025, ACG Education began a program in collaboration with local nonprofit organization Equidad ATX designed specifically to serve elementary aged youth in Austin’s eastern crescent. This program gives students attending the Turner Roberts Recreational Center for after-school engagement, the opportunity to learn and perform classical guitar with teaching artist and instructor Rey Rodriguez.
Spanish Language Support
How this transforms lives: Language access is not just a logistical support – it’s a bridge to belonging, healing, and expression. Providing these resources has not only assisted individual students but has also empowered teachers to enrich classroom environments overall, fostering a sense of inclusion and community that benefits everyone.
This year we expanded our Spanish-language video support, added new curricular materials, added Spanish language material to our student portal resource, and conducted Spanish language assistance teacher training.
Here’s a story from the Gardner Betts Juvenile Detention Center: A student who spoke only Spanish arrived feeling isolated and discouraged. Early in the semester, he was devastated when he narrowly missed earning his incentive reward, but that same day, after we played Blue Magic together, he smiled quietly, placed his hand over his heart, and said, “Se siente bonito tocar eso – lo siento aquí adentro.” (“It feels really nice to play that – I can feel it in me in a good way.”)
Carol Jean Mosher Knupp Endowment Fund
How this transforms lives: Growth in our endowment means sustained funding for ACG Education resulting not only in long-term support, but also the ability to make critical investments as we work to change the world.
In December, 2024, the Ben and Nancy Sander Family gave a major gift to the ACG endowment creating our first named office. Dr. Travis Marcum, who has been with ACG for twenty years, is now the Carol Jean Mosher Knupp Director of Education at Austin Classical Guitar. This represents a huge step toward our goal of creating a $10 million endowment to create and sustain the ACG Education Institute, which will scale and support guitar education nationally for years to come.
Spotlight Story 1: Randy Avers & Student Composers
How this transforms lives: when students’ artistry is supported, taken seriously, and given a platform, learning is amplified, memories are made, and everyone who witnesses the results is inspired.
In Fall of 2024, composer, guitarist, and our dear friend Randy Avers joined us in Austin all the way from Norway to celebrate the idea that beautiful music can be created with intention as gift to another person. Randy wrote and prepared an entire program of deeply personal pieces written for and with his friends. At the same time, three incredible students worked with him, and ACG Education Director Travis Marcum, to compose pieces for loved ones in their lives. All of this hard work culminated in two public, world-class concerts presented in the spirit of giving. Here, you can see Bowie High School Senior (now UT Austin Composition Freshman) and Randy perform her piece Ancestor, written as a gift to her family members long past.
Spotlight Story 2: Pepe Romero & Students
How this transforms lives: when students’ artistry is supported, taken seriously, and given a platform, learning is amplified, memories are made, and everyone who witnesses the results is inspired.
GIVE was a major project devoted to intergenerational collaboration, cultural exchange and generosity. It ran from August 2024 through May 2025 and brought together nine young guitar students to perform with ACG’s Artist in Residence, the legendary guitarist Pepe Romero. The project was guided by our 34th Season theme, also named Give, which was a celebration of the gifts that each of us can choose to share and an invitation to notice how these gifts transform over the course of our lives.
It is important to know that Pepe Romero is one of the most significant living guitarists. For the past 65 years he has toured the world as an elite artist. In the 1960’s, Pepe Romero’s father founded Los Romeros with his sons. Together they established the guitar quartet as a new and important genre and developed an iconic repertoire of Spanish music.
The students are of high school age and come from all over Austin: Paul Devens, Noah Melendrez, Kian Mitchell, Satvik Chawla, Allen Liu, Brandon Kim, Jianna Zamora, Teddy McCoy & Greg Sonnier. The students were grouped into three ensembles and prepared to perform with Pepe Romero playing Los Romero repertoire. Over 10 months, the three quartets were mentored by local teaching artists Joseph Palmer, Stephen Krishnan & Alex Lew with support from the ACG team (Travis Marcum, Tony Mariano & Joe Williams).
Pepe worked with the students in week-long residencies in the Fall & Spring. The project culminated in multiple performances across our city, most notably four major concerts on ACG’s internationally celebrated Live at The Rosette series. This was a long term unique project with deep investment in the education and artistic development of these young artists and that resulted in a life-changing experience. Read more about this project here.
Special thanks to atsec information securities for ongoing sponsorship of our ACG Artist in Residence Program.
THANK YOU
ACG’s education programs thrive thanks to the generosity of those who share our belief in the power of music to transform lives. We are especially grateful to the following institutions and individuals for their significant support of our work over the past year:
The Sander Family, Augustine Foundation, Webber Family Foundation, Meadows Foundation, Cain Foundation, City of Austin, Kaman Foundation, Still Water Foundation, Karrie & Tim League, Mary Raley, Rea Charitable Trust, Texas Commission on the Arts, Greg Wooldridge & Lynne Dobson, Jacqueline Rixen, Debra Lewis, atsec information security, H-E-B Tournament of Champions Charitable Trust, Louis & Mary Kay Smith Family Foundation, Jeff & Gail Kodosky, Kodosky Foundation, Megyn Leonor Busse, MD, Jack & Vanessa Wolfe, Bill & Terri Moyer, Applied Materials Foundation, Greg & Cindy Abell, IBC Bank Austin, Jeff & Jenifer Westphal Foundation, Martha P.Rochelle, Sarah & Ernest Butler, Scott & Sabrina Ellis, Texas Bar Foundation, University Area Rotary Club, Wright Family Foundation, Ed & Janet Hess, Lazan Pargaman, Louise Epstein & John Henry McDonald, Lucy & Bill Farland, Warren Skaaren Charitable Trust, Michael & Carol Fields, GuitarCollection.com, Kendal Gladish, Dr. Michael Froehls, Antonio & Sharon Ugalde, Ameriprise Financial Community Relations, Detour Film Production, Find Your Light, Joaquin Delgado, Law Office of Robert Littlefield Buford III, MFS Fund at the North Georgia Community Foundation, Pietro Caporusso, Sangeeta Kaur & Hai Nguyen, Shanti Foundation for Intercultural Understanding, Zack & Whitney Zamora, Calido Guitars, D’Addario Foundation, FG4K, Strait Music, Dr. Robert Duke, Twin Liquors, New World Deli, and many others.
