Creative Alternatives Program has found a way to harness the at-risk teen's passion for popular music for educational benefit. In the program's Creative Music Workshops, participants get a chance to compose their own music using ACID^® software. "ACID is extremely easy to use," notes Creative Alternative Programs Executive Director Victor Rook. "It's like finger-painting on the computer screen, and the end result is very cool music."

By creating a song with ACID software, kids make personal choices about which loops to use, how to put them together, and what style, tempo, and other characteristics their music should have. The kids are given a CD compilation of their work and are encouraged to publish it on ACIDplanet.com, the Sony Creative Software Web site for online sharing of independent music and video.

Rook describes the workshops this way, "A fundamental aspect of our workshops is the positive use of contemporary, popular media. ACID software gives us an irresistible connection to the at-risk teen's world, providing the essential elements of motivation and inspiration."

Rook has worked with challenging populations for 20 years, so he knows it can be "hard to hook" alternative school kids. "A lot of these kids are pretty tough on the outside," he says, "but get past the exterior and you find a wonderful individual with talents yet to be discovered."

Creative Alternative Programs has found many exciting and innovative ways to use ACID software. English composition classes have used ACID software to animate students' poetry. Geometry classes have "listened" to what their geometric forms sound like. History and current events classes have produced works mixing music from other historical periods and cultures with our own.

Rook recalls one particularly memorable project. "At Putnam City Academy in Suburban Oklahoma City we ran into an English teacher who was having trouble getting her students to write," says Rook. "To stimulate their imagination she took the class to a park with the instructions 'just write what you see' and the kids began to put together works of prose." Rook continues, "As we entered the project we recorded the kids speaking their work using Sound Forge software. The students recorded the entire work and also single words. We then prompted the students to merge their spoken work with the sounds of the Sound Series loop libraries using ACID software. The final projects were presented to the school on a big screen projection system with audio for the entire school. The project was a big success. With the help of Sony Creative Software applications these kids made the successful transformation from reluctant poets to rock stars all within one week."

The Creative Music Workshops draw each participant into the exciting, yet sometimes intimidating, cycle of risk and reward known as performance. Within a supportive group setting, kids start to feel confidence in themselves and their accomplishments. The repeated practice of listening enables each member of the group to expand personal awareness of, and respect for, others.