Editorial Board
Past Members

Janet Robbins, Associate Professor of Music Education at West Virginia University, specializes in general music methods and qualitative research and coordinates the Music Student Teaching Program. She was a music specialist with the federally funded Arts IMPACT program in Columbus Ohio before pursuing her M.M. and Ph.D. degrees from The Ohio State University. An active member of the American Orff-Schulwerk Association (AOSA), Dr. Robbins served as co-chair of the 1995 national conference celebrating the Carl Orff Centenary, chaired AOSA's Research Interest Group (1990-1994), and was a member of the editorial board of The Orff Echo (1994-2002). For the past ten years, she has worked with the Orff Schulwerk Teacher Training Course at the Eastman School of Music, both as a teacher and as director of the Orff SPIEL teacher-research project (1991-1994). She is currently studying the "composing community" in Orff Schulwerk classrooms.

Dr. Robbins' background in qualitative research has led to presentations at regional and national conferences (MENC, AOSA, the Ethnography and Education Forum at the University of Pennsylvania, the Qualitative Methods in Music Education Conference at the University of Illinois, and the Mt. Lake Colloquium) as well as publications in The Orff Echo, The Bulletin for the Council of Research in Music Education, The Quarterly Journal of Music Teaching and Learning, and The Mountain Lake Reader. She is the Southern Division chair for MENC's Society for Music Teacher Education and currently serves on the editorial boards of Research and Issues in Music Education and The Mountain Lake Reader.

James Austin, Associate Professor of Music and Chair of Music Education at the University of Colorado, teaches both undergraduate and graduate courses, directs dissertations and theses, and supervises field experiences in public schools. Dr. Austin received a Bachelor of Music degree in music education from the University of North Dakota, and Master of Arts and Doctor of Philosophy degrees in music education from the University of Iowa-all degrees were awarded with highest honors. Prior to his arrival at the University of Colorado in 1994, he taught instrumental music (grades 4-12) in Minnesota, served as a graduate teaching and research assistant at the University of Iowa, and was on the music education faculty at Ball State University, in Muncie, Indiana.

Dr. Austin's research interests include student motivation and self-concept development, teacher education, classroom assessment, and school policy implications of educational reform. His publication record is extensive, including articles in the Instrumentalist, the Music Educators Journal, Update, General Music Today, Contributions to Music Education, the Journal of Research in Music Education, the Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education, Psychology of Music, the American Educational Research Journal, and the British Journal of Educational Psychology. He regularly presents papers at national and international conferences and currently serves on editorial boards for the Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education, Psychology of Music, and the electronic journal Research and Issues in Music Education. He also is past Program Chair and current Music Education Special Interest Group Chair for the American Educational Research Association.

Dr. Austin remains active as a consultant, clinician, and guest speaker in public schools and on college campuses. During the Fall 2000 semester, he was a visiting professor at the University of New South Wales (Sydney, Australia), and also guest lectured at the University of Newcastle (Newcastle, Australia) and the Sydney Conservatorium of Music. A past collegiate chairperson for the Indiana Music Educators Association, Dr. Austin now serves on the College/University Council of the Colorado Music Educators Association. He holds memberships in the Colorado Music Educators Association, and the National Association for Music Education (MENC), the International Society for Music Education, and the American Educational Research Association.

Jackie Wiggins is Professor of Music Education and Chair of the Department of Music, Theatre and Dance at Oakland University. Known for her constructivist vision of music learning and teaching, she is author of Teaching for Musical Understanding (McGraw-Hill, 2001). She advocates a holistic, learner-centered approach that engages learners with a broad diversity of musics through interactive performance, listening, and creative problem solving experiences. The goal is to empower learners with musical understanding and competence fostering musical independence and the ability to use music as a means of personal expression. The bulk of her research has been qualitative study of children's actions and decisions when composing with peers in the naturalistic settings of general music classrooms. Her most recent work is a chapter on "Compositional Process in Music" for a new International Handbook of Research in Arts Education, edited by Liora Bresler.