Alumni Profiles
Angie Moster Fresch, MBA '03
Getting in Tune with the Nation's Youth
For the last few years, Angie Moster Fresch, MBA '03, has been busy orchestrating the national expansion of her startup. Fresch is director of the Music Playhouse, a music-education and -appreciation program for very young children (from newborn to 5 years of age). Under Fresch's careful stewardship, the business has grown from a small class in Indianapolis to a nationwide program spanning several cities, including Nashville, Dallas, Austin, Denver, Chicago, and Saint Louis.
Fresch first heard about the Music Playhouse from her sister, Debbie Aikman. Aikman, then living in Atlanta, had enrolled her two young children in Playhouse classes there, and been impressed with the results. When she moved back to Indianapolis, she told Fresch she regretted that her children would no longer be able to participate in the program, which was unavailable there.�In response, says Fresch, in the summer between her first and second year as an MBA student, "We launched the classes in Indianapolis, through a licensing agreement with the gentleman who created the class concept in Atlanta, which laid the groundwork for expansion not only in Indiana but in other cities as well."
The two sisters became business partners – Aikman providing the finance and accounting capabilities and Fresch creating and carrying out the business plan and business model. "We started the classes in Indianapolis, and used our learning experience there to build our training processes for other cities," she explains.
"On so many levels, this is what I'm passionate about," says Fresch. She had always had an interest in people development; and "although slightly different than what I might have envisioned for myself, this opportunity is on so many levels about developing people."
Between the ages of zero and five years, she explains, the brain is at its most rapid stage of development. "It all comes back to knowing that young children are at the phase in life were you can make the biggest difference." The music instruction provided by her program not only ensures the students' greater success at music in later years, but may improve their capabilities in math, languages, and sciences as well.
And Fresch reports that it's gratifying to see the difference the Music Playhouse's curriculum makes in a relatively short time: "I have some kids that started the program at six months, and by the time they're 18 months they're repeating tonal patterns and rhythm patterns – at about the same time they're also talking. It's really amazing."
– Irene Kim