Music Theory/Music Skills classes should be mandatory course's for all students to take.

My opponent touches on a lot of difference points, so for the sake of simplicity for this first argument, I will simply respond to points made in my opponent's argument. Point of contention: "Music Theory/Music Skills classes should be mandatory course's for all students to take." "Music is all around us....Is it just that?" >> This is true. Listening to music is not uncommon or unpopular. "Evidently not according...when analyzing math, english or science." >>So the study revealed that creators of musical pieces typically use more areas of their respective brains when producing these pieces than previously believed. From here my opponent hypothesizes that perhaps some of these areas are also used when exploring intellectual pursuits. This hypothesis is likely to be based off of the following (and other similar) study cited by my opponent. "At that is in fact what it will do...Pre- liminary results also indicated an improvement in student grades." >>This looks primarily to be based off an opinion poll rather than performance-based data. So it does nothing to prove that these students perform better at mathematics over time, but rather that students enjoy math and find it to seem less challenging when listing to music in class. Believing something to be less challenging is very different from actually performing better at something. For purposes of this debate, I can assume that these studies also proved that performance improved due to musical exposure during class. As an additional question...were these surveys scientifically conducted? Are these differences statistically significant? "This is an idea of the 'Mozart Effect'...attempting to cure a variety of disorders. " >>There have been studies regarding the positive benefits achieved from listening to certain sonatas by Mozart (and similar music) [Rauscher, Shaw, and Ky 1993]. These results have not been consistently replicated. In addition, other studies have found that (a) The effect may simply be due to students listening to something they considered enjoyable while performing complex tasks [Tompson, 2001]. Students in other more structured studies were exposed to multiple types of sound therapy (commonly enjoyable, upbeat music vs less enjoyable music vs enjoyable audiobooks vs etc) while performing complex tasks. The results indicated that upbeat music outperformed less enjoyable music, but primarily for those who enjoyed the upbeat music. In addition, even listening to enjoyable audiobooks resulted in improved performance vs listening to nothing [Prelude or Requiem for the 'Mozart Effect'],[Thompson, Schellenberg, Husain]. (b) The Mozart Effect was only shown to have persisted only as long as the students were exposed to the music, meaning there was no long-term benefit. (c) Studies similar to the Mozart Effect study were produced almost a decade later. These studies indicated that there was no mathematical performance benefit from listening to Mozart or Bach [Bridget and Cuevas 2000] "This brings me to my conclusion...former First Lady and Senator of the United States" >>Few, if any, of he points mentioned by my opponent lend credibility to the argument that these music theory/skills classes should be mandatory. Assuming that "mandatory" is synonymous with the concept of "illegal if not performed", then we would have to find considerable evidence that these classes provide some form of a constitutional benefit...or that failing to take these classes would cause some form of constitutional harm. In fact, my opponent is condoning the opposite. My opponent believes that we should REMOVE students' personal freedoms and FORCE these students to take these classes which they may have little interest in. This goes against the basic tenants upon which our nation was founded. And why? Because some studies from 1993 (which have since been refuted) indicated that there may be some short term benefit with regards to mathematical performance. Because some journalistic pieces from the New York Times which cited the same and similar studies discussed similar POTENTIAL short term benefits. Many people consider listening to music enjoyable, but this does not mean people should be forced to learn how to produce music. There have been studies indicated that there may be some correlation between musical exposure and mathematical performance (although it may not even be musical exposure, but rather exposure to enjoyment), but this does not mean people should be forced to learn how to produce music, or that it is necessary for students to perform well in mathematics. These decisions should be made by the students, their parents, and other qualified individuals...not politicians OR scientists. Some studies indicate that moderate wine consumption reduces likelihood of cancer. This doesn't mean it should be mandatory for people to moderately consume wine.