Band Director Gretchen Morris to be named OkMEA Exemplary Teacher!
Band director Gretchen Morris will be awarded the Oklahoma Music Educators Association (OkMEA) Exemplary Teacher Award on Thursday, January 16, 2020. The ceremony is a part of the OkMEA Winter Conference and will be held at the DoubleTree in downtown Tulsa in the International Ballroom beginning at 6:00 pm. Exemplary teachers must have completed at least 15 years of active service as a music teacher and/or music administrator and been a member of OkMEA/NAfME for a minimum of 10 years. Recipients have also demonstrated excellence in the teaching of music, as evidenced by competitions, awards, and peer or administrator statements. Exemplary teachers are nominated by their peers, recommended by the OkMEA Awards committee, and confirmed by the OkMEA Executive Board.
Gretchen Morris is Director of Bands for Caney Valley Public Schools. Previously, she was band director in Sperry for two years, Maysville for six years and Bray-Doyle for ten years. She has also taught elementary general music, music appreciation, and AP music theory. Her tenure also includes two years as Instructor of Woodwinds (Applied Flute and Clarinet) at the University of Science and Arts of Oklahoma. She has served on the faculty of the Southwestern Oklahoma State University Music Camps since 1993, where she served as administrative assistant, conducted camp bands, and instructs a variety of classes and ensembles.
Morris graduated summa cum laude with a bachelor’s of music education and master’s in music from Southwestern Oklahoma State University, where she served in Tau Beta Sigma. A graduate of Healdton High School, she was a member of the OkMEA All-State Band and the Oklahoma Summer Arts Institute Orchestra. She is a recipient of the State Superintendent’s Award for Arts Excellence and was twice selected as Bray-Doyle Teacher of the Year and Masonic Teacher of Today. In 2007, she was named Southwest Oklahoma Band Director of the Year and in 2008 served as president of Shortgrass Band Directors Association. In 2007, her band at Bray-Doyle was selected to march in the National Independence Day Parade in Washington, D.C. She also took the Bray-Doyle band to state contest for the first time in school history, making a total of four appearances and earning superior ratings in concert and sight reading. While at Sperry, she led the band to the school’s first-ever OSSAA Sweepstakes Award.
Morris is a flutist in the Tulsa Wind Symphony and the Tulsa First Baptist Church Orchestra and subs for the Oklahoma Baptist Symphony.