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2026 ACDA Midwestern Region Conference February 25-28, 2026 Milwaukee, Wisconsin

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prison choir practitioner, Weber is active as a conduc- Jody Kerchner is NEA Conservatory Pro-
tor, singer, pianist, and composer. She currently serves fessor of Music Education at the Ober-
as the director of worship and the arts at Westminster lin Conservatory of Music. She teaches
Presbyterian Church in Minneapolis. courses in choral conducting, communi-
ty music engagement, music psychology,
Catherine Roma has created vibrant cho- creativity, and pedagogy. She is president-elect of the
ral communities that reach across barriers International Society for Music Education. Kerchner
of race, religion, class, sexual orientation, is also the founder/conductor of the Oberlin Music at
and age for over forty years. She works to Grafton Prison Choir, an all-male choir at a state-level,
translate the values of social justice and minimum- and medium-security prison in Northeast
inclusion into fundamental experiences of communi- Ohio, where the choir has just completed its tenth year.
ty for both audience and singers. Roma became one Kerchner holds a PhD in music education from North-
of the founding mothers of the women’s choral move- western University, and MM in vocal performance and
ment when she started Anna Crusis Women’s Choir in BME from West Chester University.
Philadelphia in 1975 and founded MUSE Cincinnati’s
Women’s Choir in 1983. She is emeritus professor of Laura Clapp is a graduate student in cho-
music at Wilmington College. Through Wilmington, ral conducting at the University of Mich-
she has directed numerous prison choirs, beginning igan, where she directs the university’s
with the UMOJA Men’s Chorus at Warren Correction- prison outreach choir, Out of the Blue.
al Institution in Lebanon, OH. Currently she conducts A recipient of the 2025 Presser Graduate
NIA Men’s Chorus at Chillicothe-CI. In 2012, Roma Music Award, she is currently researching prison choirs
founded the one hundred-voice World House Choir in in the United States and UK. Prior to her graduate
Yellow Springs, OH, which often performs for peace studies, Clapp worked with Voices of Hope, a Minne-
and justice within prisons. sota-based prison choir organization, as a recipient of
the Yale Glee Club Service Through Music Fellowship.
Mary Cohen is a professor of music ed- While in Minnesota, Clapp also codirected StreetSong,
ucation at the University of Iowa and a choir for people who have experienced homelessness.
lead author of Music-Making in US Prisons: She has been a researcher for the New Muses Project,
Listening to Incarcerated Voices. She led the helping build their database of marginalized compos-
Oakdale Community Choir, comprising ers, and a soprano and teaching artist with Border
non-incarcerated and incarcerated singers, from 2009 CrosSing.
to 2020. The participants wrote 150 original songs, and
the choir sang seventy-five of those songs. She created
the Inside Outside Songwriting Collaboration Project Due Diligence:
with incarcerated and non-incarcerated partners who
build relationships while creating original songs. Co- First Steps for Ethical Native Engagement
hen coleads the International Music and Justice Inqui-
ry Network Caring Communities: scholars from over Choral educators are often asked to include di-
twenty countries who lead or research music making verse voices, but “due diligence” is not always part of
in prisons and collaborate virtually. She has been a the equation. In this session, we will explore what it
keynote speaker in Germany, Canada, Portugal, and means to ethically engage with Native American mu-
England, interviewed by BBC3 Music Matters, and com- sic. Thomas Goedecke and Alyssa Beltran (Pyramid
pleted over forty publications. Lake Paiute) will share how to navigate the complex

60 CHORAL JOURNAL January 2026 Volume 66 Number 5