About The Pratt Music Foundation
Our Primary Mission. Despite the proven advantages and importance of quality classical music in the lives of children, public school funding for classical music is minimal, if not non-existent. Many talented low income and disadvantaged youth never start music instruction because their families cannot afford strings or piano lessons in their early years. Once the opportunity is lost, it can almost never be regained. The Foundation attempts to bridge this gap.
The Pratt Music Foundation has as its primary mission the encouragement of musical development of children in the Bloomington-Normal area. The Foundation identifies children who have talent to excel in music, but who have not had the opportunity to pursue that talent. These children are selected to enroll in the Illinois Wesleyan University Preparatory Music Program
Our Goal. Our goal is to be a model for classical music promotion that other communities can emulate. We believe that the benefits of classical music instruction enhance perceptions about school and community and provide our scholarship students skills and attitudes that will benefit them for the rest of their lives.
The focus of the Foundation is our long-term endowment strategy: funds raised are placed in an endowment and scholarships are awarded based on endowment earnings. We want the Foundation to continue to support classical music instruction for decades to come, and the endowment strategy ensures that the funds will be there to support this work.
Origins. The Foundation was organized in the spring of 1997 in memory of Dr. T.A.E.C. Pratt. Dr. Pratt, who died on October 30, 1996, was a nuclear physicist with a love for classical music. He shared that love with his children and was their first music teacher.
Organization. The Foundation is an Illinois not-for-profit 501c3 corporation that consists of a Board of 16 Directors, the majority of whom are residents of Bloomington-Normal, Illinois. The Foundation takes responsibility for raising funds for the endowment, and for establishing and implementing policies to further its mission of exposing children to classical music. All Directors are volunteers and contribute to fundraising costs. Illinois Wesleyan University contributes overhead costs, printing, and postage. Funds raised go directly to the Foundation’s endowment. All donations are tax deductible to the extent allowable by law.
