About
What is El Sistema?
El Sistema is a community music and youth development program that began in Venezuela in 1975. It was founded by Dr. Jose Antonio Abreu to become the national model of music education in Venezuela, granting millions of young people access to quality music programming. Since then, the El Sistema philosophy of music education has spread throughout the world as a music education model that promotes community-building, empowerment, excellence, and access - in the words of Dr. Abreu, El Sistema is about "music for social change."
Left: watch Dr. Abreu's TED talk on "The El Sistema Music Revolution"
Who we are: El Sistema in Elkhart County!
ECoSistema stands for Elkhart County El Sistema, and is our county's very own El Sistema-inspired program! Since 2009, community partners have been working together to bring the mission of community-building, access, and excellence through music to Elkhart County. Thanks to partners like Horizon Education Alliance, Goshen College, the Boys & Girls Clubs of Elkhart County, the Community Foundation of Elkhart County, Elkhart Community Schools, Goshen Community Schools, Conn-Selmer, and others, our program serves approximately 300 students a year ages 5-12 throughout the county.
Click here for a complete list of our local and national partners!
ECoSistema Program Sites
Boys & Girls Club of Goshen
Song Circle (2nd grade)
Crescendo Orchestra (3rd-4th grade)
Presto Orchestra (4th-5th grade)
Teen ECoSistema (5th-12th grade)
Roosevelt STEAM Academy (Elkhart)
String orchestra
Wind orchestra
Vocal music
Drumming
Chime choir
Bashor Children's Home
Drumming for residential groups at the Bashor Alternative School
ECoSistema Staff
Hillary Harder
Program Director for ECoSistema and the Community School of the Arts
Goshen College
B.A. Music and Spanish, Goshen College
M.A.T. El Sistema-inspired music education, Longy School of Music of Bard College
Hillary Harder oversees operations and vision work for ECoSistema and the Community School of the Arts at Goshen College. She also serves as adjunct faculty at Goshen College and at Longy School of Music of Bard College, teaching courses on Music for Social Change and Culturally Responsive Pedagogy in Music Education. Hillary previously taught music at Roosevelt STEAM Academy in Elkhart, Indiana where she was honored to be chosen as Elementary Teacher of the Year for Elkhart Community Schools in 2018. Hillary serves on the board of the Elkhart County Symphony and the Program Committee for the Tolson Center for Community Excellence; she is a member of the Camerata Singers and the Elkhart County Symphony. Hillary lives in Elkhart with her husband, Micah Detweiler, their greyhound Magoo, and their cat Mo.
Kent Dutchersmith
ECoSistema Lead Teaching Artist at the Boys & Girls Club of Goshen
Goshen College
B.A. Elementary Education, minors in Music and TESOL, Goshen College
M. Mus. Ed and Orff Schulwerk Certification, Anderson University
Mr. Kent is a Goshen native who has been teaching with ECoSistema since 2019. Before that, Mr. Kent taught elementary music in the Goshen Schools System for 18 years. Mr. Kent is a multi-instrumentalist, with his primary instruments being the cello, string bass and the electric bass. He has played in classical, jazz, rock, folk, fiddle-tune, Latin, Irish and church music ensembles and has recorded 2 CDs with his family band, “Kentucky T. Dutchersmith and the Rubber Band.” Kent has soloed with the Maple City Orchestra twice on the nose flute and once on the typewriter! As the ECoSistema Lead Teaching Artist at the Boys and Girls Club of Goshen, Mr. Kent teaches Song Circle, strings ensembles and private strings lessons. He is also the primary private bass instructor for Goshen Community Schools and currently plays with the Maple City Orchestra, the Elkhart County Symphony and leads his church band, Faithful Bread.
David Gary
Co-director, Tolson Youth Choir
Tolson Center for Community Excellence
