Rebecca Udy is an accomplished violinist (Utah Valley Symphony), member of the Utah Music Teacher’s Association and well-regarded teacher. She has recently become a Nationally Certified Teacher of Music in violin. Her tech-forward approach to running her studio effectively involves the use of My Music Staff. You can read what she has to say below:
Welcome to week 2 of Techie Tuesday! I hope you tried some of the apps I have reviewed before.Today I want to talk about a program that has been a game changer for how I keep track of my studio. It is not an app, but a website. MyMusicStaff.com is a great way to keep track of students, their info, payments, business expenses, lending library and so many other things. It has a monthly subscription fee, but it is the same price no matter the size, which is $12.95/month. At first I wasn’t sure about subscribing to it since I have such a small studio, but it has made the business side of things so much easier.
I have it set up to automatically send out invoices each month to my students’ parents. I love that I don’t have to personally make each invoice. During the month if I need to add an expense to a student (such as a new book) I can quickly open the website on my phone and add it in no time. Also, I can quickly add a payment as soon as I receive it.
One feature I think would be great for other teachers is the way to keep track of notes during the lesson and then send them to the student and parent. I have tried it a few times but I have not had success with them actually looking at the notes at home. For now I will stick with my written lesson notes.
Another thing I wish the parents in my studio would use is their online account. They are able to log on and view student lesson info, account owing info, and signing up for make up lessons. I am able to see when they last logged on, and most of them have only logged on once when I sent them their login info. I’m hoping through the next year to get my parents to sign up for make up lessons online rather than contacting me.
There are many other features that I haven’t explored yet, such as online payments, lending library tracker, mileage, and all of the studio report options.
I highly recommend looking into MyMusicStaff.com to help organize your studio!
Udy, Rebecca. “Techie Tuesday 2”. Udy Studio. N.p., 2017. Web. 10 Jan. 2017.
To: My Music Staff
Would it be possible for you to prepare a handout to parents explaining how to log in and what items they can check online. Possibly as a reminder. Thanks
Hi Jo! Thank you very much for your suggestion. This is something that is on our to-do list. Feel free to send future suggestions and requests to support@mymusicstaff.com.