Research
My research interests include policy, cross-sectoral involvement, and paradigm change in music education. Currently, I seek to understand how interactions and cross-sectoral relations amongst actors from the public sector, private sector, and social economy shape the "publicness" of music education in public schooling.
How Private Sector and Social Economy Actors Shape Public Music Education in Canada: A Comparative Case Study of Music Festivals
Through my on-going dissertation research, I examine the mechanisms and implications of non-state actor involvement (i.e., from the private sector and social economy) in Canadian public school music education through tracing policy relations amongst music festival actors. In doing so, I conceptualize music festivals as both events (in which school students perform and are adjudicated by professionals) and networks (of human and non-human actors that together (re-)produce music festivals as an assembled phenomenon). Because of their institionalized and cross-sectoral nature, music festivals offer a vantage point for examining how non-state actors' interests, objectives, and logics may support or complicate the provision of music education in public schooling.
Wang, S. (in press). Elusive and illusive change: Repertoire diversity initiatives in the wind band paradigm of music education. Canadian Music Educator, 68(2) [Research Special Issue].
Wang, S. (2026, July 27). Whose stage is it? Tracing cross-sectoral involvement in Canadian music festivals, 1908–1980 [Poster presentation]. International Society for Music Education (ISME) 37th World Conference, Montréal, QC, Canada.
Wang, S. (2026, July 21). Whose stage is it? Tracing cross-sectoral involvement in Canadian music festivals, 1908–1980 [Poster presentation and lightning talk]. ISME Policy Commission Pre-Conference Seminar, Toronto, ON, Canada.
Wang, S. (2025, November 8). Listen closely: Exploring the stakes of conditioned listening practices at music festivals [Roundtable presentation]. Ontario Music Educators’ Association Conference: Harmony 2025, Toronto, ON, Canada.
Niknafs, N., Wang, S., & Moghadamfar, S. (2025, April 24). Forced migration in the bedrock of arts and cultural education: The case of Toronto [Paper presentation]. Research in Music Education 14th International Conference, United Kingdom (online).
Wang, S. (2024, November 8). Elusive and illusive change: Repertoire diversity in wind band [Roundtable presentation]. Ontario Music Educators’ Association Conference: Roots 2024, London, ON, Canada.
Chen, M. H. Y., Porter, T., Wang, S., Davi, N., Leland, C., D’Arrigo, R., Galloway, T., & Mant, M. (2024, November 2). Dendro-in-a-box: Transforming research into science education outreach to remote schools in northern Canada [Poster presentation]. Canadian Association of Geographers Ontario Division 2024 Conference, Toronto, ON, Canada.
Niknafs, N., Moghadamfar, S., & Wang, S. (2024, August 1). Music education, urban policy, and the dignified lives of refugee newcomers [Paper presentation]. International Society for Music Education 36th World Conference, Helsinki, Finland.
Wang, S. (2018, April 3). Promoting the study and performance of Canadian wind band music in Canadian schools [Poster presentation]. Faculty of Music Undergraduate Research Showcase, University of Toronto.
Research Assistant, The Pedagogical Ear: How Teachers Listen for Race in Multicultural Canada. PI: Dr. Antía González Ben, University of Toronto.
Graduate Research Trainee, A comparative study of urban music education: Examining culturally sustaining and subtractive pedagogies in context. Co-PIs: Dr. Antía González Ben (University of Toronto) & Dr. Jess Mullen (University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign).
Research Assistant, Sanctuary City: Cultural programs, music education, and the dignified lives of refugee newcomers in Toronto. PI: Dr. Nasim Niknafs, University of Toronto.
Chen, M. H. Y., Porter, T., Wang, S., Davi, N., Leland, C., D'Arrigo, R., Galloway, T., & Mant, M. (2024). Dendro-in-a-box: An educational module on dendrochronology for high school students in the Northwest Territories [Educational package]. Department of Geography, University of Toronto.