25 Semifinalists Announced For The 2025 Music Educator Award

The 2025 GRAMMYs, officially known as the 67th GRAMMY Awards, will air live on CBS and Paramount+ on Sunday, Feb. 2. Watch highlights from the 2025 GRAMMYs on live.GRAMMY.com.

The 2025 GRAMMYs telecast will be reimagined to raise funds to support wildfire relief efforts and aid music professionals impacted by the wildfires in Los Angeles. Donate to the Recording Academy's and MusiCares' Los Angeles Fire Relief Effort To Support Music Professionals.

In light of the wildfires impacting Los Angeles, the 2025 GRAMMY Week event schedule has been repurposed to focus on raising funds to support wildfire relief efforts and aid music professionals. Donate to the Recording Academy's and MusiCares' Los Angeles Fire Relief Effort To Support Music Professionals.

The Recording Academy and GRAMMY Museum have announced 25 semifinalists for the 2025 Music Educator Award. These semifinalists, comprising a total of 25 music teachers from 24 cities across 14 states, were selected from more than 2,400 initial nominations submitted from 49 states. More than 200 quarterfinalists for the award were announced in May. Finalists for the 2025 Music Educator Award will be announced in December, and the ultimate recipient will be recognized during GRAMMY Week 2025, ahead of the 2025 GRAMMYs. See the full list of semifinalists below.

Presented annually by the Recording Academy and GRAMMY Museum, the Music Educator Award honors educators who have made a significant and lasting contribution to music education and demonstrate a deep commitment to maintaining music education in schools.

Nominations for the 2026 Music Educator Award are now open.

Read More: Virginia's Annie Ray To Be Honored With 2024 Music Educator Award

The Music Educator Award is open to current U.S. music teachers. Anyone can nominate a teacher, including students, parents, friends, colleagues, community members, school deans, and administrators. Teachers can also nominate themselves. All nominated teachers are notified and invited to submit an application.

Each year, the Music Educator Award recipient is selected from 10 finalists and receives a $10,000 honorarium, along with a matching grant for their school's music program. The nine additional finalists will receive a $1,000 honorarium and matching grants. The remaining 15 semifinalists, who are not selected as finalists, will receive a $500 honorarium with matching school grants.

As working music educators, all semifinalists for the Music Educator Award are eligible to apply for Professional Membership at the Recording Academy, which allows members to play a part in creating a better world for music and its makers by advocating and fighting for music creators’ rights; helping the next generation of music leaders; submitting recordings for GRAMMY consideration; recommending other new members to join; electing the Recording Academy governing boards; and more.

The Music Educator Award program, including honorariums, is supported by The Chuck Lorre Family Foundation. In addition, the American Choral Directors Association, National Association for Music Education, NAMM Foundation, and National Education Association support this program through outreach to their constituencies.

Learn more about the Music Educator Award.

The full list of the 2025 Music Educator Award semifinalists is as follows: