How Flat for Education empowers Texas music teachers with TEKS-aligned tools and measurable student impact.
This year’s Texas Fine Arts Administrators (TFAA) Conference in Austin brought together educators and leaders from across the state to explore how creativity, technology, and standards can work hand in hand.
Flat for Education was proud to lead a featured session titled “Fine Arts in a Digital World: Keeping Creativity Aligned with Standards.”
The conversation focused on how digital tools in music education can enhance creativity, ensure alignment with Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS), and, most importantly, produce measurable student growth.
1. Inside Our Session: Fine Arts in a Digital World
Presented by Pierre Rannou (CEO & Founder), Nathan Lamy (Professional Development and Engagement Specialist), and Mason Hilligoss (Director of Account Management), our session showcased how Flat for Education supports music and fine arts programs in achieving both creativity and compliance.
Teachers explored how Flat for Education enables them to:
- Create assignments for composition, performance, shared writing, and music theory.
- Track and evaluate student work with built-in assessment and collaboration tools.
- Maintain compliance with COPPA, FERPA, and GDPR privacy standards.
“Technology doesn’t replace music education, it amplifies it; giving teachers better ways to engage students and prove growth.”
2. The Data: Evidence That Music Learning Works
One of the most powerful moments of our session came from the data, showing how interactive music learning on Flat for Education translates to real academic and creative growth.
Key Outcomes from Flat for Education Schools:
- +28% higher scores on creative assessments.
- +25% improvement in working memory capacity in children.
- +27% increase in standardized math test results.
- +20% higher performance in second language tests.
These results confirm what decades of research have suggested: that music education enhances cognitive development and cross-subject performance.
Now, through digital platforms like Flat for Education, teachers can measure those benefits with greater accuracy.
Engagement Metrics from Our Partner Schools:
- Students created over 600,000 music scores in Flat for Education, with 121,000 attached to assignments.
- For every one assigned score, students composed an average of three additional pieces independently, showing genuine engagement and creativity.
- Average grade improvement between a student’s first and third assignment: +7.07 percentage points.
This data reinforces a simple truth: when students have access to creative, standards-aligned music tools, they grow faster!
💬 Interested in learning more?
Fill out the form below to get in touch with our Implementation Team.
We’ll help you explore how Flat for Education can support your school or district, align with TEKS standards, and make music learning more engaging for every student.
3. Addressing Challenges Texas Teachers Face
Throughout TFAA, we heard familiar challenges from music and fine arts educators across Texas:
- Non-uniform assessments
- Limited classroom technology access
- Initiative fatigue and restricted budgets
- Difficulty measuring student growth
- Incomplete coverage of TEKS standards
Flat for Education directly addresses these needs through:
- Shared assignment templates for consistency.
- Scaffolding tools and history tracking to demonstrate growth.
- Full TEKS alignment and accessibility support.
- Self-driven learning features, with up to 75% of Flat for Education usage initiated by students.
The result is a digital solution that supports both classroom creativity and administrative accountability.
4. Aligning Flat for Education with TEKS Standards
As part of our ongoing commitment to Texas educators, we are developing a TEKS-aligned digital curriculum that covers every strand of the state’s music standards, from elementary to high school band and choir.
Each grade level will feature:
- Pre-built, reproducible lessons aligned to every TEKS strand.
- A searchable system for finding content by TEKS code.
- Customizable templates that teachers can modify or use as models.
- Lessons reviewed and approved through the IMRA Review process.
“We’re bringing the TEKS to Flat for Education, Texas teachers will be able to teach, assess, and align every learning objective directly within our platform.”
This effort represents a major step forward for music and fine arts education in Texas, helping schools deliver both compliance and creativity at scale.
5. The Future of Fine Arts Education in Texas
Texas is shaping the next chapter of music and arts education. The leaders at TFAA are not only managing programs, they are actively defining what high-quality, equitable, and standards-aligned arts instruction should look like for the next decade. Throughout the conference, we met administrators, principals, assistant principals, and teachers representing every fine arts discipline. Dance, visual art, mariachi, orchestra, choir, ban,d and general music were all present, united by a shared goal to give students the strongest creative opportunities possible. We also had the privilege of watching four outstanding student ensembles. Seeing that level of artistry and preparation firsthand reminded us how vibrant fine arts education is in Texas and why this work matters.
What became clear is that Texas is ready for tools that help districts strengthen instruction, provide consistent TEKS alignment, and make student growth easier to measure. Flat for Education is committed to partnering with Texas schools to move that vision forward.
Over the coming months, we are expanding our platform with a full library of TEKS-aligned lessons, reproducible activities, and ready-to-assign assessments for elementary, middle, and high school programs. Teachers will be able to search by TEKS code, assign pre-built materials instantly, and track growth with clarity. District leaders will gain a unified way to support fidelity of implementation across campuses.
This is not just an update. It is a step toward a more connected, equitable, and data-informed future for fine arts instruction in Texas. Together with the TFAA community, we are working to ensure that every music student in the state has access to meaningful creative learning experiences that are aligned, engaging, and measurable.
6. Thank You, Texas Fine Arts Administrators
We’re deeply grateful to the TFAA community for the opportunity to present and connect with so many inspiring educators.
Your feedback drives our mission to make music education engaging, data-informed, and accessible for every Texas classroom.
Stay tuned for the release of our session recording and additional TEKS-aligned curriculum previews.
👉 Learn more about Flat for Education
👉 Contact us to bring Flat for Education to your district
About Flat for Education
Flat for Education is a collaborative music notation platform used by more than 26,000 teachers across 1,600 schools worldwide.
It empowers students to compose, collaborate, and learn music online, while helping teachers simplify grading, feedback, and curriculum alignment.
With Canvas, Schoology, Moodle, and Google Classroom integrations, Flat supports districts that prioritize data-driven fine arts instruction and TEKS-aligned teaching.
Musically Yours,
Flat for Education