Price Chopper Supermarkets Expands Music Education in Hartford Public Schools With National Nonprofit Little Kids Rock

HARTFORD, CONN., June 5, 2015 /3BL Media/ – Through a unique collaboration with CBS EcoMedia’s EducationAd program, Price Chopper Supermarkets along with other CBS Radio Hartford Advertisers are providing funding to national music education nonprofit Little Kids Rock to expand the Hartford Public Schools’ Modern Band program.

Little Kids Rock is the leading nonprofit provider of free music instruction, musical instruments and teacher training to public schools across the country. Price Chopper Supermarkets’ funding will be utilized to deliver 170 new musical instruments, including guitars, drums, bass guitars and keyboards, to students in five Hartford public schools, and will provide ongoing support to music teachers in 27 Hartford public schools through Little Kids Rock.

This partnership will impact more than 5,700 public school students and contribute approximately 2,300 music instruction, hours during which public school teachers will run Modern Band music programs designed to teach the popular musical styles of the past 60 years, including rock, reggae, Latin and R&B, among other genres. They complement existing programs such as Jazz Band, Marching Band, Chorus and Orchestra. Students learn to perform, improvise and compose using the styles they know and love.

“Price Chopper Supermarkets has a long history of supporting the arts in our communities, and we recognize the contributions that music education brings to learning other subjects and developing skills in other areas," said Pam Cerrone, Manager of Community Relations for Price Chopper Supermarkets. “The pleasure of listening and appreciating music, learning to play an instrument or sing, and the expression of self through an art form all enhance the learning experience for kids. We’re thrilled to support this program and the curriculum it brings to school children who might otherwise not be able to enjoy the opportunity.”

“Little Kids Rock is grateful to Price Chopper Supermarkets for their support of music education in Hartford’s public schools,” says Little Kids Rock CEO and Founder David Wish. “It’s up to the big people to stand up for kids’ right to rock, and we are excited Price Chopper is making music a reality for so many kids.”

Representatives from Price Chopper Supermarkets, Lincoln Technical Institute, Barberino Auto Group, Tab Computer Computers, Inc., Apple Auto Wholesalers, Eblens, AAA, Kia of East Hartford, Post University, Porter and Chester Institute, Little Kids Rock and CBS EcoMedia will gather at M.D. Fox School to celebrate this unique collaboration by delivering the first of the 170 instruments and attending a live performance by students who have received music instruction earlier this school year through Little Kids Rock.

“Price Chopper Supermarkets’ support will help to expand a tremendously successful music education program throughout Hartford,” said Paul Polizzotto, Founder and President of CBS EcoMedia. “This will help students become more confident and harness their creative talents while having fun playing music in school.”

About Price Chopper
About The Golub Corporation: Based in Schenectady, NY, the Golub Corporation owns and operates 135 Price Chopper and Market 32 grocery stores in New York, Vermont, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts and New Hampshire. The American owned, family-managed company prides itself on longstanding traditions of innovative food merchandising, leadership in community service, and cooperative employee relations. Golub’s 22,000 teammates collectively own more than 47% of the company’s privately held stock, making it one of the nation’s largest privately held corporations that is predominantly employee-owned. For additional information, visit http://www.pricechopper.com.

About Little Kids Rock
Little Kids Rock is a national nonprofit dedicated to unlocking children’s inner music-makers by revitalizing music education programming in public schools. The organization partners with school districts to train public school teachers to run its innovative Modern Band curriculum and donates all of the accompanying instruments and resources necessary to teach popular music. Little Kids Rock started as a schoolteacher’s vision to give his students access to music education that is relevant to them while diminishing budgets for the arts made that more and more difficult to do. What began as a single after-school guitar class has since exploded into a national movement that is bringing free, weekly music lessons to nearly 200,000 public school children due to the efforts of nearly 1,500 teachers nationwide. To date, Little Kids Rock has served more than 400,000 students. More info at www.littlekidsrock.org

About CBS EcoMedia Inc.
At EcoMedia, we’re propelled by the desire to create positive social change; that’s been our mission since we founded the company in 2002. In 2010, after successfully partnering with CBS on a wide range of environmental projects, EcoMedia became the newest addition to the CBS Corporation portfolio, exponentially scaling our reach across television, radio, interactive, publishing and outdoor media. 

Through our patent-pending EcoAd, WellnessAd and EducationAd programs, an innovative twist on traditional advertising, advertisers are able to support much-needed local projects which in turn creates jobs, saves taxpayer money and improves the quality of life in communities nationwide. In the process, we’re fundamentally altering the advertising landscape, elevating the ordinary, traditional commercial – and media, in general – into a catalyst for tangible, quantifiable social change. Please visit ecomediacbs.com, like us at facebook.com/EcoMediaCBS or follow us at Twitter.com/EcoMediaCBS.

By participating in EcoMedia’s EcoAd, WellnessAd and EducationAd advertising programs, EcoMedia’s advertisers agree to provide funding for projects we believe will have a beneficial effect upon the environment, health and/or education within local communities. EcoMedia’s advertising programs are not certification programs nor are the EcoAd, WellnessAd or EducationAd logos seals of approval. EcoMedia does not in any way certify, endorse or make any representations about EcoMedia program advertisers, their products or services.

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Press Contact:
Theresa Schieber
212-975-3471
Theresa.Schieber@ecomediacbs.com