One can argue that music teacher Andrés Rodriguez is a renaissance man. Among his many roles is teaching modern band and drumline, being the esports coach at his school, hosting a podcast, and performing as a professional musician who emphasizes learning about the richness of Hispanic culture.
His path began when Rodriguez joined the orchestra and choir in his elementary school and continued his music education into his high school years. Rodriguez currently teaches pre-K through fifth grade at Arturo Salazar Elementary School, where he has been since 2020. Although he was active in music growing up, being a music teacher wasn’t originally on his radar.
That didn’t happen until he was studying psychology at Tarrant County College and became a marching tech at his high school, which encompassed volunteering his time and helping the new kids out with marching, he said. While helping the older students develop leadership skills, he discovered that he was quite good in this role and enjoyed it, he said.
He went on to study at the University of North Texas, which is known for having a top-rated music program. Rodriguez’s primary instruments are tuba and drums, but can play and teach multiple instruments.
Rodriguez, who is Mexican American, makes sure students are empowered by helping them learn about their rich cultural heritage, something that he said is very relevant at Salazar where the majority of students are Hispanic.
“Teaching the culture of our people and incorporating it into the western way of learning music is very important because some of my students don’t speak English,” he said. “Some of my students are ESL students, and being able to learn a song, whether it be Spanish or English, is something that everyone can do.”
Rodriguez feels that incorporating culture, such as Hispanic culture, is a way for students to connect to each other, and celebrate their uniqueness. It is a way to empower students by connecting to their heritage, he said.
“I feel like that helps grow the culture, the respect for where you came from or where your family came from,” he said.
Rather than losing their identity, Rodriguez likes to celebrate the uniqueness of his students. Not only do students learn different songs, they learn the history behind it. An example would be teaching the history of where songs such as “La Raspa” or “La Cucaracha” come from.
“Most of the students have heard of them, but what is the historical significance behind the songs?” Rodriguez said.
Rodriguez started as a teacher at Dallas ISD during COVID and used his talents to create YouTube videos to keep his young students engaged. He also has won grants to help fund the needs of his music program, which includes a modern band program and a drumline. Thanks to grant funding, his students have marching band instruments.
“We learn all of the things that you would learn in a high school drumline, but at a place where the kids can really understand and develop themselves,” Rodriguez said.
One of Rodriguez’s accomplishments was being a top three finalist in the Dallas Symphony Orchestra’s 2024 Music Teacher of the Year Award. While Rodriguez is not currently teaching strings in his classes, he said the DSO judges likely felt a connection to him teaching students ukulele because of the strings and the hand positioning—things that musicians of orchestra instruments do. Besides the grants, awards, and accolades, Rodriguez knows that the importance of music goes deeper.
“You have music literacy,” he said “You are learning the values of notes and all of the key nuances of music. But before students do that, they need to learn how to read to learn lyrics, and they have to know math because you do a lot of counting in music.”
Rodriguez plans to continue challenging his students and developing these young musicians, but mostly he hopes they will become leaders who will go out into the world with confidence.
