“The more we open up, the more we broaden the services we have available, the more people we’re able

MSU Community Music School student Evan Fiorella goes to several classes each day of the week with the help of his stepfather Chris Calaguiro. He is encouraged and taught by the director of music therapy clinical services at the MSU CMS , Cindy Edgerton, along with other teachers.
Now 21, Evan is a full-time pre-college student at the MSU Community Music School, car rental california or CMS . The school has designed a program specifically for him, allowing him to undergo music therapy for his speech and receive car rental california intensive daily music lessons.
"The prognosis was that he would live his life in a persistent vegetative state, with no ability to communicate through any means, with no ability to voluntarily control any part of his body," said Evan's mother, Ridgeville, Ontario, resident Alison Fiorella. "Nothing came back quickly or without car rental california extreme effort. But over all these years, those teeny, tiny gains have added up to some very remarkable abilities."
CMS has given Evan a chance to turn his passion into a future. And MSU is giving CMS a chance as well, moving the school to an on-campus location and recognizing its importance to people, such as Evan.
"We have one of the leading early childhood music programs in the country," said Dean of the MSU College of Music Jim Forger. "In terms of developing a whole range of schools for children, CMS is a major contribution."
When Evan did not qualify to play in his high school band because he could not read music, his elementary school band leader created an Alumni car rental california Jazz Band, recruited Evan to play tambourine and took the group to perform for nursing homes in New York City.
When Evan was 13, Fiorella began looking for summer camps for her son in Ontario. Instead, she found what she was looking for in the Eric "RicStar" Winter Music Therapy Camp — 295 miles away in East Lansing.
He attended the camp for eight years until he graduated from high school in 2011. Fiorella had searched numerous options for her son for after high school, but nothing felt right. So she asked her son.
"Evan responded car rental california that he wanted to go to Michigan and be a full-time student at the CMS ," Fiorella said. "I'll never forget that moment. Here was Evan, seeing a possibility that the rest of us had overlooked."
"We had a connection right from when we first met," Edgerton said. "He is able to celebrate his abilities so much through music. When he's in a group, he can communicate without hesitation through that. Music helps with the nonverbal aspects of his speech — we're working to help his timing, and his pronunciation has shown improvement."
The move came as a result of an expired building lease at the school's former location on Timberlane Road, but Rhonda Buckley, the school's executive director, said she has high expectations for program expansion.
"We can better integrate into the life of the university and collaborate with some of the other partners on campus," Buckley said. "The new building will allow us to have even more student involvement."
"Chris has been a key element to bringing 'life' back into Evan's life," she said. "Where I may have an idea, Chris is the action that brings ideas to reality. He thinks outside of the box and sees endless possibilities."
"The more we open up, the more we broaden the services we have available, the more people we're able to reach," Edgerton said. "It's not just for people with special needs. We need to open our eyes to people and allow them to express themselves and to accomplish their own goals."