Adriana Diaz-Donoso

Dr. Adriana Diaz-Donoso (ella/she/her) is a Music Assistant Professor and Director of Music Education. She holds an M.A. and an Ed.D. in Music Education with concentrations in early childhood education and developmental psychology from Teachers College, Columbia University. Additionally, she received a B.Sc. from the Universidad Nacional Agraria La Molina (Lima-Peru) and studied music at the Asociación Cultural Béla Bartók and the Universidad Nacional de Música del Perú.

A Peruvian bilingual (Spanish/English) educator and scholar, she is committed to expanding access to meaningful arts education and promoting social justice through the arts. Her research focused on equity and access to music education, early childhood musical development, the role of arts organizations in community building and social change, and diversity in music teacher preparation. Her dissertation, Musical Investment in Early Childhood: An Exploration of Parent-Child Participation in Organized Early Childhood Musical Activities, examined the intersection of social class and musical parenting, expanding understandings of these practices beyond the white-middle-class experiences that have traditionally dominated early childhood music education research. 

In recognition of her contributions to early childhood music education, Dr. Diaz-Donoso received the 2026 Dr. Marvin Greenberg Award for Research in Music and Development in Early Childhood Music Education from the Early Childhood Music Education Commission of the International Society for Music Education (ISME) for her project, The Music Children Make in Early Childhood: Pathways to Musical Development in Peru. During the 2025–2026 academic year, she also participated in NYU Faculty Write, a professional development program that supports faculty in translating their research and expertise for broader public audiences.

An educator and scholar with more than twenty years of experience, Dr. Diaz-Donoso has designed and implemented inclusive educational programs and curricula that expand access to high-quality music learning for diverse communities. In the United States, she has served as an educational consultant for Columbia Head Start, The Philadelphia Orchestra, Lincoln Center, and Teachers College Community School. In Peru, she taught general music and piano in schools and private studios and served as a consultant for the Ministry of Women and Vulnerable Populations. Prior to joining NYU, she was Manager of the WeBop early childhood jazz education program at Jazz at Lincoln Center and Adjunct Assistant Professor of Music Education at Teachers College, Columbia University.

At NYU, Dr. Diaz-Donoso is committed to connecting university coursework with authentic community-based learning experiences. In 2024, she received an NYU Student Activities Grant from the Provost's Office to support experiential learning in her Teaching Music in Elementary Schools course through partnerships with the Louis Armstrong House Museum, Terraza 7, and Jazz at Lincoln Center. The initiative enabled pre-service music educators to deepen their understanding of jazz as both a rich artistic tradition and a culturally responsive approach to music teaching.

Dr. Diaz-Donoso is a recipient of the Fulbright Scholarship.