Watergrass Teacher Wins State Music Award

By Matt Wiley

Music is known to bring joy to people’s lives. In the case of one Wesley Chapel educator, it is her passion that she has spent decades sharing with her students — and it hasn’t gone unnoticed.

On January 17, Watergrass Elementary’s Karen Reinhold received the Florida Music Educators Association’s 2013-14 Music Education Service Award in recognition of her 30 years in music education. However, Reinhold, 54, says that she doesn’t feel like it has been nearly that long.

“I love doing what I do,” she says. “The past 30 years have been a pleasure. Receiving this award definitely is an honor.”

Reinhold says that she has been singing most of her life, a hobby that was bolstered by singing at her church while growing up in southern Illinois, where her father was a Baptist minister. She says it wasn’t until high school, however, that she realized that teaching music was what she wanted to do.

“If it wasn’t for my high school chorus director, I wouldn’t be doing this,” Reinhold explains, emphasizing that her choral director really helped her realize that music education would be in her future.

Following high school, she went on to get her Bachelor’s degree in Music Education from Eastern Illinois University in Charleston.

Reinhold began teaching in Pasco at Lake Myrtle Elementary in 1992. She then taught music at both Denham Oaks Elementary in Lutz and Wesley Chapel Elementary before joining the staff at Watergrass in 2009.

“I love being able to instill a love for music in my students,” Reinhold says. “We’re always doing some sort of singing or playing instruments. We do it all, but I’d say the kids love the drums the most.”

Congratulations to Karen Reinhold from the Wesley Chapel Neighborhood News!