Professional certification: an interview with two successful candidates from diverse backgrounds.(Association News)(Interview)

Kayme Henkel is a doctoral candidate at the University of Wisconsin, Madison who currently lives and teaches in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and Karen Warmuth is an independent piano teacher in Jefferson, Wisconsin.

Why did you decide to work toward certification?

Karen: It was partly for my own self-esteem. I want to be taken seriously as a piano-teaching professional.

My piano teaching came about when someone heard me play and asked me to teach their son piano lessons. I was in high school at the time. Then my college piano professor (Winona State College) my freshman year asked me to take a piano pedagogy course that he was starting. I graduated from Dr. Martin Luther College with a B.S. degree in elementary education and a concentration in music. Piano teaching was put on hold for the two-and-a-half years of teaching in a Lutheran elementary school and until my piano could be moved from my in-laws' home, where it was stored during our several years of moving every year from one apartment to another. Then, when we were in western Nebraska and I was one of the church organists, someone from church asked me to teach their daughter piano and word got around. Soon I had a group of students that included my own five children. I feel like the Lord ...