All musicians start out as absolute beginners. Some might progress as self-taught, others might have private music lessons, and many will pick up their first instrument in school. But without a musical pathway—consistent access to physical instruments and dedicated music educators year after year—budding musicians will falter on their journey. 

For Nema Robinson, and the thousands of other Baltimore City student musicians who have benefited from extra-curricular, free, equitable music education through programs like the Baltimore Symphony’s OrchKids and Peabody Institute’s Tuned-In program, these communities have opened musical doors to a professional career in music and so much more. Now on track to graduate with a music education degree, Robinson has reached a full circle moment to teach at the programs that set the stage for her own success.

The first violinist plays a long, drawn out A. The other musicians settle their feet against the stage floor and their backs hover near, but don’t quite touch the backs of their chairs. Suddenly, the noise of the orchestra breaks across your ears—briefly discordant and separate—but as the players all search for the same A, the notes weave together into a pleasing buzz of anticipated energy. In tune together, they look expectantly at the conductor. 

Among the Uggs and Vans and Crocs and Nikes nestled under the music stands are Nema Robinson’s double-buckled black platform Mary Janes. Robinson, a fourth-year music education student and Linehan Artist Scholar, is at one of her teaching gigs that supplement and complement her degree. Today, she’s in Friedberg Hall at the Peabody Institute in Mt. Vernon, Baltimore, as part of Tuned-In, a free musical study and youth development program for Baltimore-area students. The elegant marble relief sculptures that flank either side of the stage and the gentle curve of the stairs leading to the second story seating section are just the background to the real art on the stage: Middle and high schoolers are making music.

In Baltimore City, only 60 percent of public schools have some type of musical component, says Nick Skinner, the vice president and founding team member of BSO OrchKids—which also offers free, community-based, high-quality music instruction and programming in the city. Of that, only 12 percent of city schools have instrument programs, compared to nearly 100 percent in nearby Baltimore, Howard, and Montgomery county schools. “There’s no musical pathway. So if you’re lucky enough to have music in your elementary school, you may not be able to continue that music study sequentially into middle or high school,” says Skinner. “It’s a really patchwork model of how students can progress musically through their education.” 

When former BSO conductor Marin Alsop began her tenure in the city, she saw a need to fill this gap, and in 2007 founded BSO OrchKids. As Skinner tells it, Alsop saw that “many of our students here in the city were locked out of these opportunities to have the power of music in their life—to benefit from the inherent value of playing an instrument and the benefits that come from the study and the artistic process of learning an instrument.”

Asked to lead

When Robinson was a kid, she was walking around Artscape with her mom waiting to see her cousin perform on stage. Artscape in Baltimore City is the nation’s largest free outdoor arts festival, famously held on whatever is the hottest weekend in the summer. Robinson recalls getting to the event early and waiting in the unbearable heat. They found a place to sit and wait for her cousin’s opera performance and during that period OrchKids took the stage. “And my mom was like, ‘Oh my God, all these Black musicians playing classical music.’ We immediately got applications, and all of this started from there.”

Young Nema Robinson playing the violin and with a group of BSO OrchKids. Robinson is crouching in purple, and fellow UMBC student Rickerra Bassett is standing in front with a teal shirt. Photos courtesy of Robinson.

In fourth grade, Robinson joined OrchKids and thought she wanted to play the tuba. Her mom shot that down for practical reasons, like 11-year-old Nema being able to even carry the instrument. “I’m still too small to play the tuba,” says Robinson. Her instrument of (second) choice was the violin, and through the daily after-school sessions at OrchKids and the all-day Saturdays at Tuned-In, along with numerous other musical opportunities she’s taken part in, Robinson has far surpassed the lauded 10,000 hours on her way to becoming an expert.

On stage in the Linehan Concert Hall rehearsing with UMBC’s Chamber Ensemble, Robinson stands in a semi-circle with a dozen other musicians. At this point, she’s been playing for 10 years. As the group launches into a slow baroque minor key waltz, Philip Mann, the conductor and assistant professor of music, stops them short. “Let’s move closer,” he says to the collection of string instrumentalists. With a shuffle of music stands, the ensemble tightens the circle. Black leather Doc Martens now firmly planted beneath her, Robinson leans into the music with her instrument familiarly tucked beneath her chin.

Before UMBC had a chamber orchestra—an intimate group of musicians—Robinson played in UMBC’s Symphony Orchestra, which is open to staff, students, and community members. She was a section leader her first year at UMBC. “I had to make sure I was locked in because this was a really big deal in a university just starting out. I think for me it was definitely nerve wracking, like, ‘Oh, I can’t mess up. But the conductor said, “You’re doing great. Just play.’” As time went on Robinson saw that as a music major and a Linehan Scholar, she was being asked to lead. 

“I slowly adapted,” says Robinson, “and then I started to realize that music majors—maybe that’s why we are the section leaders—because we are setting an example for the community members.”

Listen to different nuances

Ann Sofie Clemmensen, director of the Linehan Artist Scholars Program, knows this was intentional. “Across the arts, we do lean on scholars to lead some assignments because they are receiving resources that others are not. In the music department, in dance and theater, and visual arts, we’re identifying leaders and those who can become leaders. And I think that’s what UMBC is very good at.”

This May, the Linehan Artist Scholars Program is celebrating three decades of supporting an arts-focused community at UMBC. Founded with support from Earl and Darielle Linehan, the scholarship supports students with an exceptional interest in the arts. Specifically, the program “acknowledges the importance of artists as leaders. As artists, we understand that a production or an orchestra is a component of many things that have to have some sort of organizational aspect,” says Clemmensen. “You have to listen to the different nuances.”

Robinson has found the scholars community to be uplifting and collaborative. “Insanely great,” to use her exact words. “It’s really cool to see how everyone else is very invested in their art, and it made me realize how it’s all tied together,” Robinson says. When she heard fellow OrchKid and Tuned-In student, Rickerra Bassett, was thinking about UMBC, Robinson immediately connected the young violist to Linehan, where she is now a first-year double major music education and performance scholar. 

This is the dream

Bassett started at BSO OrchKids during kindergarten, practically still a baby, she says. She stayed through her senior year, and like Robinson, has continued to work for the program as a graduate. Despite the camaraderie and the support BSO OrchKids offers, Bassett said it is rare that a student stay in the program for their full K-12 experience. “The main reason why I stuck with it is, well, I enjoyed it. I also realized how high demand violas are—there’s not as much competition for me to participate in orchestras compared with violin, so I feel like I’ve gotten way more opportunities because I play viola.”

“Rickerra and Nema are in so many ways, shape, and form what we always hope OrchKids to be,” says Skinner. “We’re always striving to improve, but looking at their trajectory—that is the dream in a lot of ways.” OrchKids has paved and paid the way for Robinson, Bassett, and many other musicians to attend prestigious music camps in other states, perform on the BSO’s Meyerhoff stage with world-class professional musicians, participate in the YOLA National Festival in Los Angeles, and so many other opportunities in addition to their daily musicianship classes and other education supports. And now they’re at UMBC, learning to mentor the next generation of musicians. 

“In so many ways,” Skinner says, “they are the definition of what OrchKids is hoping to achieve.”

Watching other young people discover the joy of sticking with an instrument gave Bassett, who also played with Tuned-In, the idea to double major in music education. “Seeing the younger students get so excited about things that we would probably think of as small was just the sweetest thing,” says Bassett. “I was seeing myself in them since I started that young. And I’m just hoping that they keep going. I want to motivate them to keep going.”

Music as social transformation

It’s not just about the music. Or rather, the music is more than the music classes. “I can’t believe how much the musical development and the social development are connected,” says Daniel Trahey, who co-founded Tuned-In at Peabody in 2007, coincidentally the same year he was a founding team member at OrchKids. “When you see someone like Nema—when she saw what she was able to do—her confidence level just skyrocketed once she started practicing. And this is so key to all of our kids, we need our kids to be thinking about themselves and investing in themselves in order to be better for others. And the thing that’s the most amazing to me is to see someone like Nema start to invest in herself, start to map out time for only themselves to sit down and practice when their other friends are off doing other things.”

Skinner puts it similarly: “When learning an instrument, you’re developing skills that you don’t even really realize that you’re forming—creativity and collaboration, leadership, the responsibility of practicing your instrument or making sure you have your music for a rehearsal. These are skill sets that our students are forming from a very young age that become embedded in them and can then easily be reapplied. There’s a tremendous amount of research that’s been coming out over the past decade about the power of music and how it impacts the brain. There’s almost nothing like playing an instrument when it comes to really enhanced brain function and activity, cognitive development, and executive function capabilities.”

Rickerra Bassett has been playing the viola since kindergarten in programs like OrchKids and Tuned-In. Photos courtesy of Bassett.

For Robinson, the structure and consistency of the programs she played in was key. They gave shape to her education and the expectation of practice and performances, and ultimately shaped her talent and her work ethic that shines through her myriad teaching roles. 

Trahey stops mid-sentence to brag on this young professional. “Nema is what, 20 years old? She has the best attendance, the best timeliness. She is the most professional at sending emails. She takes her job so dang seriously, it is inspiring to me. And Nema plays a very important role at Tuned-In because for our high school kids, who are really sick of hearing from me, they’re listening to Nema because Nema’s got real world experience.”

Trahey’s hopes—and part of Tuned-In’s goals—is that the program would be fully staffed one day by graduates of the program. Commitment to continuum is how they put it: students become the teachers. “By valuing the community the student comes from, the student will want to come back and work toward creating an even healthier community,” says Trahey. 

In the big picture view, the musicianship classes and camps and performances—they’re all leading toward social transformation, but Trahey doesn’t want that to mean that the students leave their communities behind along the way. “I hope for most of the kids, to do what they want to do, and then find a way to also give back to their communities. We’re already seeing this where our students have gone on to get political science degrees or medical degrees, and then they become our largest advocates, and so for many of the communities that we’re working in.”

“We are really looking at how we can use music as a vehicle to open up the world to our students,” says Skinner.

Robinson saw music education in action by watching Brian Kaufman, associate professor of music education, teach at BSO OrchKids. He helped her discover music education as a major and the idea to pursue it at UMBC. “He was just very passionate about it. And you can just see it in the work and the community he created,” she says. “And when I visited, UMBC felt so welcoming.”

From his years of watching her as a student and then as an assistant, Trahey says, “Nema’s always had it, but I think UMBC and the music education program has really helped her get a more global perspective. Before she would concentrate on maybe one kid’s problem or two kids’ problems. And now I’m seeing her be able to really serve the needs and hear the voices of every single child in her ensemble or in the room that she’s working in, and that’s been a huge growth point for her since being at UMBC.”

Not an everyday type of thing

Back in the marbled hall at the Peabody Institute, Robinson is threading through the music stands on stage to offer encouragement and correction to the young people on stage. The lead instructor has stepped away to give the reins to Robinson. 

Mi’onte McGhee, a high school violinist who has been playing with Tuned-In for four years, says, “Nema is such a big help to us. She’s really good if you ask her a question about technique—you don’t even have to ask sometimes, she just comes up and says I can help you with that, but she’s really nice about it. She never makes you feel like you can’t play. She’s really kind and knowing that she’s gone through all this before helps me relate to her.”

For Robinson, there’s nothing like the feeling of creating music with people. “It’s like you’re in a different zone, if that makes sense. It’s not necessarily an everyday type of thing, she says. “You definitely have to have a good intention and really put your all toward it. It’s doing something you’re very passionate about and then putting it forward. It doesn’t always make sense, but when you do it, it feels right.”

Graduate Assistantship Announcement

B.S.: Bio Forensic Science

Ada Glaser ’25, social work and individualized study (INDS), is following in her mother’s footsteps with career pursuits in social work. Growing up, Glaser’s family supported children who were placed into foster care, an experience that informed her passion for helping children and families who’re navigating challenging circumstances. Upon completing her undergraduate studies a year early, the Sondheim Public Affairs Scholar is excited to continue her social work education with a goal of one day supporting young children in their development. 

Q: What led you to UMBC, and what motivated your decision to major in social work?

A: As a Baltimore County native, I wanted to stay close to my family. When I went through the college selection process, I didn’t know much about UMBC, but as I looked more into the school, I came across the Sondheim Public Affairs Scholars program, which seemed awesome. I applied and ended up getting into the program. As the oldest of six, the program’s financial support made it really realistic for me to go to college. It was great to see all of the different angles for approaching the general idea of public service as a Sondheim scholar.

My mom is a social worker and has her own private practice. When I was in high school, my family started supporting children in foster care. Getting to see all the work that social workers were doing with foster families opened my eyes to the profession. I started doing research on my own and thought social work seemed like a great field for me. My time in the Baccalaureate Social Work program reaffirmed that decision for me because I loved the classes, the professors, and my peers. I know it’s the right field for me. 

Q: As an INDS student, what went into designing your major?

A: I always knew I wanted to work with kids. It’s something I’ve loved for a really long time. As a social work major, you need a second area of concentration. I originally came to UMBC wanting to study psychology, and I realized after my first year that there was so much else that I wanted to learn and do beyond the scope of psychology. I reached out to INDS advisor Holly Cudzilo and she explained the process of creating your own major. Cudzilo was instrumental in helping me develop my INDS concentration and making sure I stayed on track. The program allows you to put together the areas of concentration you want to do, define what the overall focus of the course is, and how to put the threads together that connect everything. That process helped me refine what I care about and what I’m passionate about.

Q: Who has helped you along your academic journey? 

A: I met Jayshree Jani, associate professor of social work, during my first year when she was my advisor. During our first advising appointment, she was aware of my plan of wanting to graduate early and wrote out the three-year plan that I’ve followed. She’s shown me how much she cares and how much she wants me to succeed. She’s given me good advice about how to make my senior capstone project come to life and gave me good ideas to try. She encouraged me to feel confident to do difficult things. 

Q: What experiential learning opportunities have you been a part of? 

A: My senior year social work field placement was at the Furman Templeton Preparatory Academy elementary school in West Baltimore as a social work intern. I worked with the kids on things like emotional awareness and regulation and goal setting. Some of the students are experiencing a lot of interpersonal conflicts, so I helped them think about how they can address those conflicts. I’ve done lessons in the classroom, such as working with kindergarteners on how to be a good friend. I also worked with my supervisor on school-wide initiatives such as managing testing anxiety for fifth graders and attendance initiatives. It’s been a very intense and emotional experience, but also a great learning experience.

Q: What are some of the things you’ve learned from your experience as a social work intern?

A: I learned just how much there is that I don’t know and sometimes you don’t always know how you’re going to react to something until you’re in the moment. In some of the more intense situations, I thought I would be okay handling them and then I realized those moments affected me a lot more than I thought it would. That’s one of the benefits of why social work has this practicum element to it because you have to practice these skills and get used to being in intense situations. I’ve built up my resilience and learned about my own style as a social worker. 

Q: How do you find time to take care of yourself and reset after those intense moments?

A: I’m big on journaling—I’ve been that way since middle school. It’s such a good way to dump all of my feelings and sort through them. I feel lucky to have good friends in my circle so when I’m going through something I talk it through with them and my sister as well. In the last year and a half, because of UMBC, I’ve gotten more into yoga. I took a lot of the free yoga classes at the Retrievers Activities Center, and now I do it at least three times a week. With that physical motion, I can get out of my head a little bit. 

Q: What other activities did you participate in outside of your studies? 

A: The Social Work Student Association (SWSA) has been such a big part of my time at UMBC. I was worried about being in a human services field at a more STEM-focused school, but I have found so much support, inspiring people, and encouragement through that group. Getting to be on the SWSA’s executive board and seeing this community develop has been so special. I’m also a part of UMBC’s Symphony Orchestra, which I’ve been involved in since my sophomore year. I play the upright bass. I started playing the bass in the fifth grade and continued through middle and high school. I love playing, growing my skills, and being able to connect with other people outside of my major. I love the end of the semester concerts that we do. 

Q: What are some memorable highlights from your time at UMBC?

A: The people that I’ve met and the friends I’ve made have been highlights for me. Studying abroad in Cape Town, South Africa, in 2023 was also monumental. It was something I didn’t initially think I would have been able to do, but thanks to the Sondheim program, I got to experience community-engaged learning in South Africa as well as learning about the history of the country, the Apartheid movement, and a lot of the political movements that are happening now and how South Africa is dealing with that history. My college experience would have been so different had I not been at UMBC. I credit the university for a lot, and I’m glad that I went here. 

Q: What are your aspirations for the future?

A: After graduation, my plan is to pursue a master’s degree in social work that focuses on working with children and families. I’m hoping to be placed in a Head Start program for my master’s because I learned during my internship that I love working with kids within the preschool age range. I also learned that I have a passion for working with kids with disabilities and I’m interested in exploring more of that. 

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