Kids are busier than ever with travel sports, marching band, theater and other time-intensive activities, and it’s directly impacting private music lessons. In this episode John Kozicki (Michigan Rock School and RockSchoolProprietor.com) and Mandy York (Music Time of Milford) explore why these shifts are happening and share practical steps studio owners can take to retain student.
In this episode:
- How kids’ increasing activity load due to sports and other extracurriculars is impacting attendance and retention in private music lessons
- Strategies for studio owners to retain students amidst busy schedules, even when other activities demand more of their time
- The importance of empathy and relationship-building in student retention, even if a student needs to take time off from lessons
- Why the way that you communicate with clients in these situations can help or hurt your word of mouth marketing.
This episode explores the increasing busyness of kids due to sports and extracurricular activities. The way in which private lesson instructors and studio owner handle these difficult situations can impact if they retain or lose students. Tune in for strategies to adapt and maintain relationships with students and parents when music lesson schedules compete with sports.
Rock School Proprietor is a podcast for independent music school owners and lesson studio operators looking to attract more students and create a sustainable business. New episodes drop Wednesdays at RockSchoolProprietor.com and on all podcast streaming platforms.
Interested in the Building a Band Program webinar?
We’re planning a free live webinar to accompany the Building a Band Program series of episodes on Friday, July 24, 2026. John will go deeper on the topics and answer your questions directly. If you’re interested, send an email to info@rockschoolproprietor.com with the subject line Webinar and we will be in touch with details.
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Episode Transcript:
(Please note: This transcript was generated by robots. There may be errors. For the best experience, please listen to the podcast episode.)
John Kozicki (00:01.261)
Welcome to Rock School Proprietor Podcast. My name is John Kozicki.
Mandy York (00:20.14)
and I’m Mandi York.
John Kozicki (00:21.769)
Mandy, we were talking last week about how in general, I mean, I think this was more a personal thing. Our kids are busy. But then then we see that in our businesses as well. We see that kind of overflow into our business life. Kids these days.
Mandy York (00:32.216)
Yeah.
Mandy York (00:41.996)
Yes. Yeah. Kids these days. Yeah. That’s kind of how I feel about this topic.
John Kozicki (00:51.557)
Yeah, and specifically, we were talking personally, and you were talking about how busy your daughter’s theater schedule is. And I had mentioned, yeah, I’ve got a student at the music school, at the rock school, who’s in a similar situation where he’s been leaving his band rehearsals 15 minutes early every week to get to
to get to theater and are kids busier now? Are they?
Mandy York (01:30.094)
Yeah, I think so. I think so. Okay, I hear myself saying kids these days, like back in our day, but I think that kids really are busier. think this particularly like club sport, travel sport, business is a lot bigger than it used to be.
John Kozicki (01:33.426)
I think they are.
John Kozicki (01:38.61)
Right?
John Kozicki (01:51.062)
Mm, yeah. Mm-hmm.
Yeah, that is for sure. And that I did a little bit of looking. mean, anecdotally, I just, my nephew is in travel baseball and I’ve seen it with him, but I did do a little kind of looking online and yeah, all signs point to yes, travel sports are much more demanding and a typical week for a kid on a travel team.
And you my daughter was in competitive cheer. So this track’s typical week is practice maybe three to five days a week. And then many weekends, you’ve got these two to three day tournaments that are out of town. And so that doesn’t leave a whole lot for much else when you consider they’re in school for seven hours during the day in the week.
Mandy York (02:52.717)
right.
John Kozicki (02:55.163)
So, and I know personally for my daughter, she would like try and like shoehorn time in with friends and it just did not leave much time for anything else.
Mandy York (02:56.063)
Yeah, no,
Mandy York (03:09.165)
It’s really busy, some of these activities. And I did, I have come across some articles and interesting information about the industry in general. The number that I kept seeing was that the club and travel sport industry is a $40 billion industry. And that they’re being funded by private equity firms. This is a growing business.
John Kozicki (03:27.453)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (03:32.84)
Yeah.
Mandy York (03:36.525)
I’d say within the last three to five years, there’s been a big surge too. I just think that’s very interesting. There’s a lot to read out there about this trend.
John Kozicki (03:40.876)
It’s.
John Kozicki (03:44.977)
Yeah, and it’s infiltrated its way into school sports too. don’t know if I’ve ever, I know I’ve shared this story with you. I don’t know if I’ve ever shared it on the podcast, but when my daughter decided to try volleyball in middle school, and we’re talking seventh grade, she’d never done volleyball before, it was within a few weeks of being on that team that we were hearing
Mandy York (03:53.474)
Yeah.
John Kozicki (04:15.206)
Well, if she wants to do volleyball in high school, then she really needs to get on a club team. And if she ever wants to get a scholarship to play in college, she has to be on a club team. this is, again, within weeks of us starting this brand new sport that she’d never done before, we kind of felt like we’re being indoctrinated. And at the time she was doing another, a different activity that was like really high demand on her time. So.
that made the decision easy, like, no, we’re not going to do this, but you’re right. And it does make me wonder. I mean, obviously we’re going to bring this back around to what we do in music schools and how we we deal with this. But anecdotally, I feel like I’ve been seeing
this, I don’t know if it’s in response to the demands of sports, but activities like, even like marching band and drumline in high school seem to be like demanding more time and commitment of kids these days, which has never really been a thing.
Mandy York (05:29.545)
Yeah, I would agree. It’s, some of these programs, you know, whether they’re sports or arts programs, I, I get the sense or there’s a feeling of, you know, if this is what you choose, this is what you choose. And there’s no wiggle room. You have to be at every rehearsal and every competition. And if, you know, if you don’t want this enough, if you’re not committed to being
John Kozicki (05:49.692)
Yeah.
Mandy York (05:56.13)
you know, part of this team, whatever it might be, then maybe it’s not for you if you can’t commit fully. That’s intense for a seventh grader, you know, a middle schooler. Yeah.
John Kozicki (06:01.372)
Right? It is.
Yeah, and I didn’t really know that about what you’re saying about the private equity firms. It sort of makes sense. You know? Yeah. Yeah.
Mandy York (06:15.157)
Yeah, it’s wild.
Mandy York (06:21.921)
And they’re multi-season. So you’re not only playing baseball in the fall, you know, there’s like, you also play in the winter, there’s indoor baseball. It’s you’re, you’re committed to a sport, you know, almost year round in some cases. And my daughter, she’s, she’s played volleyball and we did club volleyball and definitely there’s good experiences. I’m, not here to like knock these programs. They’re, they’re great for kids.
John Kozicki (06:27.142)
Right.
John Kozicki (06:39.848)
Mm-hmm.
Mandy York (06:51.775)
I’m a big proponent of balance, but, you know, she would play for the school season and then head into a club season. Right. And, and then summer is for training, you know, clinics and things like that. So you can make your sport, your one sport a year long commitment. I do feel, I do feel that that’s different and more intense than it has been.
John Kozicki (07:00.711)
Yeah.
Mm-hmm. Right.
John Kozicki (07:10.653)
Yeah.
John Kozicki (07:16.2)
Mm hmm. So the yeah, the question then for us, right, has yeah, as music school providers, I I’m I, you know, and this is something obviously we’ve been dealing with for a long time when it comes to sports. But it’s just more recently that I’ve been feeling this.
Mandy York (07:22.155)
Where do we fit in?
John Kozicki (07:38.216)
kind of coming from marching band also. you know, in a sense, my gut reaction is like, wait, we were buddies. You know, we’re both doing music. Why can’t you do both? You know? So yeah, that feels weird and different. But so what do we do? What can we do?
Mandy York (07:45.567)
Haha
Mandy York (07:50.433)
Mm-hmm, yeah.
Mandy York (07:59.384)
Yeah, well, I’m wondering about like, first, like looking at how it does affect us, right? Do you, do you feel like maybe music is the, is an easy thing to cut? Like we’re looking at our schedule, we got to drop the lesson, the music lessons. That’s the first thing to go. Yeah.
John Kozicki (08:07.993)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (08:17.221)
for sure. mean, yeah, in my notes, I mean, I’m fully planning to get into that. Yeah.
Mandy York (08:26.847)
Okay. Okay. Yeah. And because of the high demands of the other like coaches and directors, it doesn’t leave room for the music. I think, okay. Can I tell a story really quick before we go on and dig into all that? Okay. Cause I think this is really great. And, you were just talking about marching band marching band programs, and this goes for all of the
John Kozicki (08:36.463)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (08:42.948)
Yes, please do.
John Kozicki (08:51.314)
Yeah.
Mandy York (08:54.731)
the activities we’re talking about, whether they’re clubs, sports, or like marching band programs, theater programs. It’s regional. It’s, you know, some places are, have more programs like this than other. It’s, you know, it depends on where you’re living. The district that your studio is located in has a competitive marching band program, right? Okay, so that’s why you’re dealing with that.
John Kozicki (09:09.352)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (09:17.756)
Yeah, correct.
Mandy York (09:22.303)
My, my daughters are going into a high school. My oldest is, outside of this, outside of the district that you teach in and, her Mrs. H is the, the band director there at the high school. and I was blown away at how she, how she did her recruitment for the high school band program. So my daughter’s an eighth grader. they have like a, an eighth grade high school.
John Kozicki (09:37.032)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (09:47.303)
Mm-hmm.
Mandy York (09:52.32)
night in the fall where all of the eighth graders visit the high school. I think they did like some sort of clinic with the high school band director. They got a, each eighth grader was paired with like a high school buddy to kind of tell them about the program. And then they did a small, like a one song kind of choreographed marching band thing on the field one night. Okay.
So this is, this is what, band directors do. Like this is their recruitment. They’re recruiting from the middle to the high school and all of us parents go to watch and see how wonderful it is and make sure our students sign up for her marching band. know, it was a really cool event. The thing that I loved was Mrs. H stood up, the kids played, right? they’re conducted by the, the,
John Kozicki (10:26.92)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (10:36.87)
Yeah.
Mandy York (10:53.377)
the student conductors. They did a wonderful job. And then Mrs. H stood up and talked about how important it is that her students are well-rounded and high school is an exciting time. We’re not only thinking about joining the high school band, we’re thinking about entering high school, right? This is a big deal. And she’s talking about how much she wants all of her students to be well-rounded, what an exciting time high school is and the…
John Kozicki (10:56.402)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (11:07.144)
Mmm.
Mandy York (11:23.405)
how much they offer at the high school. And she turned to her students and she said, okay, how many of you were in the fall musical? And a bunch of the high schoolers raised their hands. How many of you are taking one AP class? A bunch raised their hands. How many are taking two AP classes? More kids raised their hands. How many of you were on homecoming court? How many of you, you know, played a fall sport?
John Kozicki (11:51.848)
Mm-hmm.
Mandy York (11:52.27)
kids recently. She demonstrated like visually for us to see how many of her
one at least 150, at least 150 high school band students were also involved in all these other activities in the high school. You know, it was, it was really like effective. and it made me realize that it made me appreciate her so much that she didn’t run her program, which is objectively a good program. It’s not highly competitive. And she loves to say like,
John Kozicki (12:08.614)
Yeah.
John Kozicki (12:24.954)
Mm-hmm.
Mandy York (12:31.125)
If you come to her with, with a situation like, I’m really interested in, you know, this equestrian team or whatever. She’ll be like, okay, we’ll figure it out. Get me the schedule. We’ll, we’ll make it happen. She’s very accommodating. Now.
John Kozicki (12:43.943)
Yeah.
John Kozicki (12:48.688)
I think I’m going to interject here because you used the word accommodating. I would swap that for empathetic.
Mandy York (12:52.404)
Yeah.
Mandy York (12:58.837)
Yeah. Yeah. Mm hmm. Yes. She’s empathetic and she, you know, she works with the students. Like I said, her program is objectively very good. She’s not, she’s not letting kids miss rehearsal whenever they feel like it. Right? Like she has standards. but she knows that, that it’s, she wants these kids to have music in their lives.
John Kozicki (13:07.164)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (13:17.96)
Mm-hmm.
Mandy York (13:28.723)
And if, if you’re going to say to a kid, well, you can’t do music if you’re going to do volleyball in the fall, like you can’t do marching bands. So I guess you have to choose. She’s not doing that to them, right? She’s saying, no, well, I’ll, you know, work with the coaches. We’ll look at the game schedule and, and make it so that they can do both. So I, I just loved that. And I think that it’s really important for us to remember is that.
John Kozicki (13:38.65)
Right. Yeah.
Mandy York (13:59.042)
These, these kids are young and they’re in this like really exciting stage in their life where they should be exposed to other things and they should be doing, trying new things. So how do we translate that to our private studios? Right.
John Kozicki (14:13.596)
Right, yeah, because I’ll say as great as what Mrs. H said is and as empathetic as she is, I would also argue that for us as studio owners and private instructors, the stakes might be a little higher because we’re talking about losing students means losing
losing revenue, losing income, right? So it’s a little bit tougher. And I think we also have closer relationships with our students because of that, especially with private lessons, because of that private lesson dynamics. So it’s a little bit closer to home, maybe. Yeah.
Mandy York (14:46.061)
Yeah.
Mandy York (14:59.095)
Yeah.
Mandy York (15:06.899)
Yeah, yeah, I can see that. Yeah, well.
lay it on me. What are you thinking? What do you do? Yeah.
John Kozicki (15:17.152)
What do we do? Oh boy. Well, there’s a reason I swapped your accommodating word for empathy. Well, it was also foreshadowing on my position to take an empathetic approach. all right, let me reference my notes here. Number one, this is a problem.
Mandy York (15:29.485)
It is a better word.
Hehehehe. Hehehehe.
John Kozicki (15:45.937)
Right? Like as studio owners, as private lesson providers, we lose students to sports. We do. And some of these more organized group activities, it’s like, it’s how it is. So, I mean, the big picture question is like, are we going to change how sports?
Mandy York (15:56.269)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (16:14.342)
required these commitments? No, right? There’s, I mean, we can’t change it. So if we can’t change that and we can’t control it, then we have to look at this as like, all right, well, it’s a problem. How are we going to adapt to it? I mean, number one, I’d readily admit that the frustration is real, right? It’s legitimate.
Mandy York (16:18.891)
it nope
John Kozicki (16:44.598)
music lessons and private lessons especially I think are vulnerable because they’re competing with this bigger thing.
the schedules that parents are given from these organizations and these larger activities, they don’t budge. You know, again, we can’t just change it because the parents are hearing, well, this is the schedule. know, like how many times, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard things like, well, we’re waiting to see what the soccer schedule is.
Mandy York (17:25.835)
Yeah. Yep.
John Kozicki (17:26.862)
or we’re waiting to see what the baseball schedule is, right? So no moves are happening until they get that soccer schedule and then they can schedule around it, right? So that’s not gonna budge. We’re not gonna change that. Another thing we’re up against is the kids have, like their identity is,
Mandy York (17:30.177)
Mm-hmm.
Mandy York (17:42.061)
Mm-hmm. Right.
John Kozicki (17:56.241)
in a sense, tied to this activity, right? That’s strong. And maybe even equally as strong is the kid and the family’s sense of community tied with this activity.
I I look at, again, I look at my nephew in travel baseball and even when they’re not at practices or whatever, they’re really getting together with these families. So, like, are we gonna change that with our once per week music lesson?
Mandy York (18:40.205)
No. And if you ask me, it’s just like, it’s the, the snowball is rolling down the hill, getting bigger and bigger with this, with the club sport thing. So no, there’s no stopping that. It’s going.
John Kozicki (18:50.888)
Hahaha!
Yeah, yeah. So, right, right. So how do we feel? I mean, I think
on my worst days, I’m like, I’m bitter. And, you know, it feels like, as the the, like the music lesson provider, as the studio owner, as the instructor, you know, you have this relationship and you feel like you’re you’re lesser than, right, you’re, you’re prioritized, prioritized as less important than than these other enrichment activities.
right? I think it’s easy for us to take that personally.
Mandy York (19:37.869)
Yeah. Yep. I agree. I’ve been there.
John Kozicki (19:41.497)
so funny, funny side story here. I know another studio owner and he’s, he’s told me this, this story about when he got the phone call or was approached by a parent saying like, Hey, we got the hockey schedule. We’re, we’re going to have to stop. We’re gonna have to stop guitar lessons because of the hockey schedule.
And he, I don’t remember exactly what he said, but he was like, well, why don’t you just ask them to change practices? Why don’t you just ask them to change the practice dates? Right. And like, I laugh about it because I think it’s like, that’s cool. He had the guts to say that. Um, but I also, you know, in, in hindsight, I sort of put myself in
Right now I’m putting myself in that parent’s perspective, in that parent’s position. And how they would feel in that situation where they’re saying, hey, we got the hockey schedule. Unfortunately, I can’t see a way that we’re going to be able to make these lessons work. So we’re going to have to stop. And then to be sort of engaged in this conversation about like,
Like, why don’t you prioritize us higher over hockey? You know, I don’t know. How would you feel in that situation as a parent, I guess?
Mandy York (21:20.521)
If I’m the hockey mom, like, I don’t have any control over it, right? I can’t. I don’t have any control. I can’t go back and…
John Kozicki (21:26.705)
Exactly.
Mandy York (21:33.526)
Yeah. So, I mean, I wouldn’t want to argue about changing the hockey schedule with the band teacher. But I mean, I would be, and I have been as a mom, frustrated with like, waiting for a theater schedule to come out, waiting for, you know, audition results to see if we’re even going to be in the show.
John Kozicki (21:42.855)
Yeah.
Mandy York (22:02.305)
waiting for registration to open for a certain activity. Like, there’s, our kids are over scheduled and our parents are juggling all of these activities, right? Yes. We’re setting alarms to remind us when to register because we got to do it the day of if we want the spot that we want, et cetera, et cetera, right?
John Kozicki (22:12.774)
Mm-hmm. Yes. Yes.
John Kozicki (22:23.366)
Right. In my opinion, all the more reason to, and I’m kind of building a case for trying to put our feelings aside and trying to be empathetic. But here’s the other thing about, and I’ll speak on private lessons alone. Private lessons structurally are vulnerable.
Mandy York (22:33.13)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (22:52.39)
to the scenario. And what I mean by that is they’re one on one. They’re easy to quit. is no, I mentioned the students, a kid’s identity tied to that activity and the community tied to that. there are no teammates to let down in private lessons, right? There’s no, you don’t have a coach.
saying like, hey, you gotta commit to this and that’s the way it is, right? So I think structurally private lessons just are vulnerable. So like one, like I said, we have to just sort of accept that we’re not gonna change how sports and these other activities are operating. Two, we also have to accept like how we’ve set up private lessons.
Mandy York (23:21.526)
Yeah.
John Kozicki (23:50.929)
and they’re just more vulnerable to this, right? And remember that one, parents are probably thinking like, if they quit private lessons, then they can come back to it when the sports season’s done, right? As long as there’s a spot, they can come back to it. And leaning back into that empathetic thing, it’s not like…
Mandy York (23:54.38)
Yeah.
Mandy York (24:09.527)
Yeah.
John Kozicki (24:20.358)
It’s not like there’s a character flaw with the kid, right? That the kid doesn’t like music lessons anymore or is like, you know, likely could be an inner struggle. It’s not like, I’m choosing, I’m choosing music or I’m choosing sports over music, you know? It’s not the kid’s fault. It’s again, it’s like, it’s the system that is built, right? And I think,
We have to take ownership of that for our part as how private lessons have been built. You know?
Mandy York (24:56.141)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yep.
John Kozicki (25:00.012)
Okay, now, I would be remiss. Is this feels like a lecture now? Okay. So I would be remiss though to say, like,
Mandy York (25:07.915)
I don’t know, I’m here for it though. Okay, let’s go.
John Kozicki (25:17.722)
It sounds like I’m patting myself on the back here, but you know, like a band program. Yeah, it doesn’t have the same structural vulnerability. And it’s not because we’re trying to force kids to stay in music as like a means to keep them in or to get them to not quit or just like this tactic so that they won’t quit.
Mandy York (25:22.417)
Yes. No, that’s what I’ve been thinking the whole time you were talking. Yes.
John Kozicki (25:46.204)
It’s literally like the structure that we’re building is creating all of those things that I said the kids don’t want to leave that are tied to sports. Like the sense of community and the sense of identity, right? So we’re not like creating a reason for them to stay in music. It’s like organically that reason.
Mandy York (26:04.353)
team.
John Kozicki (26:15.337)
is materializing, right? So, you know, like I’ve had those conversations with parents where they say, oh, she doesn’t really doesn’t, she doesn’t want to leave soccer, but she really loves band, you know, we’re gonna find a way to make it work.
Mandy York (26:37.229)
Yeah. Yeah. It’s, and it, I mean, it can be difficult. I, it can be difficult depending on your structure, depending on your school, like what kind of flexibility you have, right? Because I’ve had, I’ve had, my, my setup is a lot different. I do group classes, right? Young, young children.
you know, sometimes they go to try a new activity and the schedule is off. And, but I can say, well, we have openings on this day or this day. Right. So you try to make it work now to be flexible. sometimes families will take a break, right? Sometimes that’s just the way it has to happen. And it does it is, but once you take a break,
John Kozicki (27:28.243)
Mm-hmm. Sure.
Mandy York (27:36.374)
It’s really easy not to come back, right? That’s the danger there. So I, I think it’s important to have systems in place to keep track of those families and to make sure you reach out and say, Hey, we’re setting up our summer schedule, our winter schedule, whatever the next season is. We’d love to have you back. Like what’s, what’s your availability? Like this season.
John Kozicki (27:40.232)
Yeah.
John Kozicki (27:50.121)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (28:00.167)
Yes.
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (28:06.568)
Yeah, yeah, so that’s the case for, you know, like a very good email list and, you know, staying in communication with those people. Yeah, and my position is in large part about, I guess, removing, like trying to not be emotional about it. You know, like removing that emotion, like, yes, it sucks. Yes, we can take it personally. But we really…
Mandy York (28:12.876)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (28:34.044)
Like again, going back to kind of structurally how we’ve set up private lessons and how, you know, the other activities and sports have set up their schedules. It’s like, I think trying to take the emotion out of it, but then also, because then we can make better decisions about like the reality of what this is, right? And the reality of it is also,
You mentioned this yourself, parents are feeling this pull as well. Parents are feeling the pressure. coming at this from a place of empathy where like if we got really rigid about it.
Mandy York (29:07.01)
Yeah.
Mandy York (29:18.327)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (29:20.266)
And we said, like, all right, well, you have to choose now.
Mandy York (29:23.981)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
John Kozicki (29:25.35)
You have to choose music lessons or soccer.
We’re basically setting up this binary scenario where it’s winner takes all.
If we do that and we’re talking about a private lesson only studio, we’re probably gonna lose more time than we’re actually gonna win. Yeah, go ahead.
Mandy York (29:51.82)
Yeah. And, and how many kids, how many kids are going to lose out because of that mindset? Right. Whereas if you have a more flexible mindset, maybe they’re going to miss a season or maybe they take a few weeks off. I don’t know, but then they come back.
John Kozicki (30:00.912)
Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yes.
John Kozicki (30:12.088)
Right. Well, so yeah, and my point is when we are faced with this, hey, soccer starting, football starting, whatever schedule is really tough. I think coming from a place of understanding is going to be received well from parents. Because I think how
Mandy York (30:35.949)
Mm-hmm.
John Kozicki (30:40.338)
how these students exit in these situations. And again, this is another case for removing our emotions from it. How these students exit becomes really, really important because if…
If it is what it is and they’re going to leave for four months and they genuinely want to come back, well then if we send them out the door with that door still wide open and being understanding, being empathetic, then that’s what the parent’s going to remember. That’s what the student is going to remember versus if we let our bitterness show and
that may have closed that door like you were saying, right? They may have a harder time coming back. Now, I’ll also add, and I think this is a very smart and strategic business tactic, word of mouth is our strongest marketing tool.
Mandy York (31:51.245)
Absolutely.
John Kozicki (31:53.543)
So every one of those kids, every one of those families who leaves our studio for sports, for a season, their parents are on the sidelines talking to other parents.
If they leave our studio and our bitterness shows through in them exiting, or if they’re left with a bad taste in their mouth about how it ended, chances they’re going to refer pretty low. If again, we put those feelings aside and realize it’s like, okay, this is what it is and we are understanding and empathetic, well then
they’re much more likely to one, come back, two, refer us to those other parents.
Mandy York (32:48.001)
Yeah, definitely. It’s about the relationship. It’s always about the relationships. Mm hmm. Yeah. Yeah.
John Kozicki (32:50.822)
Yes. Yeah. I mean, we’re service providers, right? Like we’re providing a service, but that service is based on trust and based on the relationship, like you said.
Mandy York (33:04.173)
Mm-hmm. Yep. I like to say, we’re really going to miss you this session, for whatever we, like, you know, sometimes maybe it’s a new baby’s coming or things like that. Like, keep me posted on, you know, how things are going, and I hope we’ll see you in the next session, right? Maintain that email list. Ask how the soccer season was. Ask, you know, those…
John Kozicki (33:24.584)
Yeah.
Mandy York (33:33.185)
those personal questions. It goes a long way. It goes a long way. I have, you know, you know this with your clients too, like.
John Kozicki (33:38.513)
It does.
John Kozicki (33:42.184)
Mm-hmm.
Mandy York (33:44.461)
We work with a lot of good people. We care about them. And they, you know, they care about us and they want to send more families our way and yeah, keep the relationship positive.
John Kozicki (33:55.7)
Yeah, yeah. And I get it. It’s it’s hard to not take this this stuff personally at times. But I think giving these families the benefit of the doubt, understanding that they’re in a tough position to they may not not want to leave us for sports, but they feel like they have to because they’re forced into this situation where the demands are so high.
Mandy York (34:02.103)
Mm-hmm.
Mandy York (34:27.009)
Yeah, I think one thing we can do.
throughout the relationship too is to always be educating parents. We talk about this a lot. I talk about this all the time, right? I have, you know, I give parent education pieces in my classes. I, you know, I email newsletters, things like that. And then I also have private conversations all the time about the students and their activities. And I think
educating parents on the importance of well-rounded kids. You know, like just reinforcing that idea all the time. And that the community we provide really is just as positive as, as any of their other communities. And, you know, I too, I do think about like the, the, importance of like the long lasting effects of music education, right? I’m not knocking sports.
John Kozicki (35:28.297)
Mm-hmm.
Mandy York (35:31.522)
Don’t yell at me, but you know, like I, love sports. do. and they’re, great activities and you know, I’m, my, my daughter’s not going to be a, a professional volleyball player, right? But she’s probably going to sing and play the rest of her life. You know what I mean? Like music, music has really long lasting effects. I would hate, I would hate to cut.
John Kozicki (35:32.969)
Hahaha
John Kozicki (35:50.631)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Mandy York (36:01.419)
to cut that so soon, you know, too early in their education.
John Kozicki (36:07.847)
Yeah, and I think those are all great things to talk about and share with, as you were saying, education with these studio families. I’ll add that I was looking back at our previous episodes, because remember we did this episode, why music lessons are losing to sports. Kind of a similar topic. That was episode 18. was way, way, way, way back there.
Mandy York (36:28.685)
Mm-hmm.
Mandy York (36:34.413)
Wow. 18.
John Kozicki (36:36.617)
So worth revisiting that one. If I recall correctly, I got a little bit more on my soapbox about create an interactive community and do an ensemble program or band program. I think that was a little bit more preachy on that side of it. So that one’s worth taking a listen to, I think. Okay. Closing thoughts or did we make our case?
Mandy York (36:51.805)
Yeah, yes.
Mandy York (36:58.295)
for sure.
Mandy York (37:04.353)
I think we made our case. It’s… yeah. Very good. Thanks, John.
John Kozicki (37:06.441)
All
John Kozicki (37:10.249)
It’s a real challenge. Don’t take it personally. But yeah, be proactive about it. Have a plan. Have a plan. Because we know this is going to come up seasonally. We know it’s going to come up in the fall with volleyball and football. We know it’s going to come up in the spring with baseball and soccer. Is soccer in the spring? don’t remember. No, soccer ends in the spring, doesn’t it? Or ends in the summer? I don’t know.
Mandy York (37:21.751)
Yes.
Mandy York (37:36.045)
I don’t know. I don’t have any soccer players at my house.
John Kozicki (37:39.379)
hockey in the winter? Yeah, I don’t know. Okay. All right. Well, we’ll wrap this one up then and we’ll see you next time.
Mandy York (37:41.719)
Yep. I know.
Mandy York (37:47.672)
Sounds good. Thanks, John. Bye.
