Tulsa Guitar Lessons | Instructor Transition

This content was created for Curtis Music Academy

 

As an institution that teaches Tulsa guitar lessons. One of the things that happens periodically is that a teacher has something come up and they have to discontinue teaching their students. This could be because of a number of reasons. It could be because the instructor is moving away from Tulsa. It could because the instructor is starting a new full time job somewhere else. But for whatever the reason today what we will be discussing is what happens to the students that are taking Tulsa guitar lessons that are with this specific instructor when the instructor leaves, and this is a very important transition period because it doesn’t matter how good or bad the instructor was, whenever there is a transition, there is potential for students to not enjoy the transition of leaving and moving to a new instructor during that transition period. 

 

So because of this, you have to be very strategic in the way that you format the transition so that there is no ability for the student to dislike their new teacher or the transition and what all of that looks like. So the first thing that we want to do is we want the student to meet their new teacher before the old teacher has left. This isn’t always going to be the case because sometimes students quit or they miss a couple of Tulsa guitar lessons and because of that, it could be that this student is, I might be able to attend the lesson from the time that the instructor told them that they were leaving to the point when the student comes back from vacation or whatever it is. So that is something that could happen. 

 

Another thing is that as the student meets the new instructor, we want them to view that person as someone who is knowledgeable in their instrument. We want the student to view them as a awesome person. So it’s very important that they meet the instructor and see them as a awesome person so the instructor could observe the previous instructors Tulsa guitar lessons and they could go through and get a good idea of how this student has been learning and that sets them up for success as they begin to teach the Tulsa guitar lessons moving forward. That is some [inaudible]. I think that it’s very important. We want our instructors to be set up success as well. That way all of the bases are covered and this students are happy, the instructors are happy and there’s not any downtime in between. Switching of the instructors, once the student has met the instructor, the new instructor, 

 

one of the things that we would want to explain to them is that the instructor is now going to be leaving for whatever reason. Now as we explained this, we want to keep it in a positive light, not a negative light. So because of that word, usage is very important and we can explain the positives of the new change for the instructor. For one situation, one of our instructor Dars is transferring to a new school and they are leaving the school that they currently attend at the University of Tulsa and they’re transferring out to a different school. And so as we explained to our students that this specific instructor is leaving, we want to explain how happy we are about the new 

 

adventures and the upcoming events of this change for that instructor. And of course we will miss them but we are excited for them and we are excited for what will be happening with your Tulsa guitar lessons because we have this awesome instructor that you have already met that you already like and that is who you will be moving forward with and taking lessons from and that is how we would want to do that. By keeping everything positive and explaining the excitement for what is moving forward with the Tulsa guitar lessons and with that specific instructor. Now one of the things that Curtis Music Academy strives to do is to explain that we are not just your coach, we are also your friend and that is something that we talked about from day one as students begin taking lessons. So of course it is important that we would explain to our students that the new instructor will still be a great 

 

teacher for them because they have bonded with their previous instructor for quite some time and seeing them leave would certainly be a little bit of a bummer. However, a lot of students don’t realize how awesome other instructors could be. They mainly just focus on how they are currently taking lessons in, how much they enjoy those lessons, but they’re not necessarily thinking of any other instructor or the possibilities for the upcoming instructor to teach them. Because of this, it is very important to help the students to realize that no matter who they take lessons from, assuming the institution is a good one, it doesn’t matter who they’re learning from, they will continue to strive for the most amazing musician that they can be. And that is important. 

 

As an instructor, it’s important to see your students grow regardless of what they are doing. So continue on with the fact of learning the music and as the instructor changes and as the transition runs smoothly, then you can help the student to maximize every little part of the transition instead of wasting one or two or three weeks. Just trying to figure out where one instructor left off from the previous lesson. And one thing that we’ve talked about in previous articles is using cameras in your studio spaces. 

 

And this is another reason for accountability for all sorts of reasons, but if you can use your cameras, then if an instructor leaves, you can also set your in new instructor up for success by implementing the previous videos of that instructor and helping the new instructor to see where it is that they left off. And they can see even more lessons in action from a specific student and they can get a really good sense of where that student is in their musicianship throughout the course of taking lessons. And that is very important for taking music lessons.