Friends of South Florida Music, Inc.

Friends of South Florida Music (FSFM) is an award-winning non-profit organization founded in 2016 to provide early child music education to students of all abilities in under-resourced communities in Miami-Dade County. This year, founder Dr. Joy Galliford and FSFM were presented with the 2024 Arts and Education Inspiration Award by the Arts and Business Council of Miami. Previous honors include two nominations for the “David E. Lawrence Jr. Champion for Children” award from The Children’s Trust, a CBS 4 “Miami Proud” spotlight feature, and recognitions from the Women’s Chamber of Commerce of Miami-Dade and Young Patronesses of the Opera. 

FSFM brings music education, enrichment, and developmental activities, free of charge, to the classroom, during the school day, by implementing our research-based Music FUNdamentals curriculum and community engagement activities in disadvantaged Title 1 schools in Miami-Dade. Title 1 is a federal program that provides supplemental funds to assist schools with large concentrations of low-income students.   

Our organization values all individuals and celebrates their unique gifts through music. The most rapid rate of learning happens in the first years of life, so early exposure to music education may have the greatest impact on an individual’s future achievement. It is our purpose to help each student grow and develop into the future contributors and leaders they were meant to be. 

To further equity in our region, we concentrate our efforts towards schools in communities that do not have the same access to resources as most others may. For many of these schools, music programs are the last items to be funded, if at all. Music FUNdamentals addresses the gap in schools that are unable to offer a formal music program with a music specialist by providing free, year-round, weekly 30-minute music classes to over 1,600 children from 12 schools and 111 classrooms where we positively influence students’ gross and fine motor coordination, auditory learning, listening comprehension, and self-help capabilities.

Our curriculum was built on results of over 20 years of early childhood research conducted by Galliford. A 2005-2011 study concluded that Music FUNdamentals, exclusive to FSFM, not only positively affected students’ musical outcomes, but also increased their linguistic development and non-linguistic concepts such as spatial relations. Our primary goal is to expand the investment we make in students by maintaining continuous service in the schools we have taken on; adding new classrooms there; and also adding new schools as we are able to fund them. 

FSFM has prioritized the communities of Cutler Bay, Florida City, Goulds, Homestead, Liberty City, Westchester, and West Flagler. Faced with many challenges, over 95% of the students’ families are on food assistance programs (SNAP). Demographics represent 70% Black/African American, 25% Hispanic, and 5% Other. The student population includes children with autism, Down syndrome, cerebral palsy, and other varying abilities.