Edythe M. McArthur Award

From her humble beginnings as a full time student and part time band director in Taylorsville in the late 1950s, through the magnificent Henderson (Starkville) Junior High Bands of the mid 1970s, to her small but immaculately taught West Point Junior High Bands of the early 90s (about which she often commented that this was where she did her best teaching), Edythe McArthur was the unquestioned pioneer for women music educators in Mississippi.

While she never considered herself a "womens-libber", Mrs. Mac paved the way for future generations of women in music education not simply by being one of the first women in what was at that time a male dominated profession, but by being the consummate professional, master teacher and a lady in the truest sense of the word that she was.

The Edythe M. McArthur Outstanding Women in Music Education Award seeks to recognize an outstanding female music educator in Mississippi. Nominees must have at least ten years of active music education teaching experience in Mississippi, a documentable record of success and contributions to the field of music education, and demonstrable professionalism and ethics of the highest caliber.