Kilgore College apologizes after music throwing incident

KILGORE, Texas (KETK) – On Monday evening, the Kilgore College Board of Trustees heard from several graduates of their music program.

Their concerns arose after irreplaceable musical scores, CDs and vinyl records were thrown into the trash.

Kilgore College is responding to criticism after photos of discarded music in a dumpster were shared online

Photos of materials in the trash quickly caught people’s attention after they were thrown away shared on social media.

“The fact that Kilgore College has thrown out music that cannot be easily replaced sends a disturbing signal,” said one alumnus.

Kilgore College explained that their music library is adapting to new materials, technologies and programs.

KETK News spoke with Board President Lon Ford about his reaction to how the items were thrown away.

“It didn’t happen over one weekend. The band members, the musical group and a few other people looked at it for several months, trying to catalog it, categorize things, and certain things were left out.” Ford said. “We are very sorry for this and the board, speaking to everyone, is just trying to make sure it doesn’t happen again. Anything that has a history associated with the university, we definitely want to preserve and value greatly.”

College President Brenda Kays also apologized at the board meeting.

“I also want to personally apologize to the entire university. I sincerely regret that this has caused disgrace. The lessons learned will improve our processes and operations. The trash bin was a bad choice,” Kays said.

Sandra Siler, retired principal of piano at Kilgore College, said she believed the music could have benefited someone else.

“We could have an auction, sell these things, or donate them,” Siler said.

The board said the music program continues to maintain the collection and the college will make efforts to contact a third party to assist in accurately selecting the works.

“KC has reached out to the people who removed the items from the dumpster to try to contact them and find out more about the items they had, but at this time their calls have not been answered,” Kays said.

Some community members are asking for more action to be taken to ensure this never happens again.

“They need to find out who issued this decree, and if and when music returns, make sure there is a place to keep these wonderful works,” Siler said.

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