Berklee and its international collaborators come together on the global challenges of teaching contemporary music.

By Rob Hochschild
Berklee.edu Editor
June 4, 2004

Images from the 2000 BIN Summit in Greece: In the top photo, Akihito Fuse (left) and Koyo President Takanori Sugauchi at a meeting in Elatos. In the lower photo, BIN participants pose in front of the Acropolis.

"We have come very far from that devastating earthquake," says Akihito Fuse, who chairs Koyo's theory and guitar departments and is chair of international affairs. "Berklee helped us a lot and we are very honored that all the schools will come to Kobe for this kind of meeting."

Representatives from Koyo and most of the 13 BIN partner schools will attend the summit, which will be held June 18–24, 2004. Among scheduled activities are several meetings among partner schools, two video teleconferences with Berklee officials in Boston, and a concert at Kobe's Nada Hall.

Education issues that will likely top the agenda include music technology, distance education, and collaborations between partner schools, says Associate Vice President for International Programs Larry Monroe.

"Mostly what's important for the summits is that every two years, the partners can come together and interact with each other," Monroe says. "I've been trying to say to the partner schools that Berklee is the hub and you're the spokes. If you want to go around the wheel, you don't have to go through the hub. So the schools in Greece and Israel have collaborated on something. The school in Tokyo has a regular interaction with the school in Seoul. In a lot of ways, the schools are closer aligned to each other than they are to us."

Such collaborations are important, Monroe said, because of the obstacles many schools face in establishing contemporary music institutions in countries where classical and traditional music forms are generally given more support than are programs that teach genres like jazz, pop, and r&b. Schools derive benefits from their BIN partnership because the association with Berklee helps raise their status and bolster recruitment. Berklee also has credit transfer agreements with several BIN schools, an arrangement that allows students to receive Berklee credit upon enrollment here for courses they took at their home schools.

Fuse said that about 20 Koyo students came to Berklee during the past academic year through credit transfer.

"Berklee certainly helps us to recruit students," Fuse says. "We provide good fundamentals to our students and we can provide students the higher goal of going to Berklee."

There's a likelihood that BIN schools will ask about Berklee's new president, Roger H. Brown, and his commitment to the college's international outreach, says Monroe. President Brown, who officially took office on June 1, following the 25-year tenure of President Emeritus Lee Eliot Berk, will speak with partner schools during one of the summit's Boston-to-Kobe video conferences.

"[President Brown] is very excited about BIN," says Monroe. "He thinks it's important to many aspects of Berklee and he thinks it's an important component in Berklee's overall outreach and recruiting."

One BIN school that will be attending the Kobe summit is the newest partner, Newpark Music Centre, in Dublin, Ireland. Newpark offers to students a comprehensive jazz program, directed by bassist, educator, and author Ronan Guilfoyle.

In other news, Berklee College of Music and Escuela de Musica Contemporanea (EMC), in Buenos Aires, Argentina, have decided not to renew articulation and BIN agreements due to a difference of opinion about terms. Berklee will honor the articulation agreement for those EMC students who have enrolled in courses before the end of June 2004. EMC will take whatever actions are necessary to ensure a smooth articulation process for students transferring to Berklee. Any questions should be directed to Berklee's Office of International Programs.

Links of Interest
•	Berklee International Programs
•	2000 BIN Summit
•	1998 BIN Summit