Jane Howell

Jane spent the first forty-years of her life in Salt lake City, Utah. In high school she spent most of her free time in dance and arts classes. She loved to choreograph modern dances and that is where she learned to listen to music.

She was a young mother and graduated with a BS in Psychology from the University of Utah the same year her oldest child graduated from high school. Jane loved spending time with her family and enjoyed taking classes as time allowed. She continued to study art and graduated with a BFA in Art Therapy in 1991.

During Jane’s 20-years as a student at the University of Utah she worked in the art department and was the director of the Owen Reading Room. She moved to Roseburg in 1992 and worked for the Umpqua Valley Arts Association where she was the Director of Education. She also worked as an art therapist at the VA Hospital, Adolescent Day Treatment Center and Mercy Medical Center.

In 1999, she moved to La Grande to marry the love of her life, Jim Howell. Her appreciation for music educators and the Oregon Music Educators Association began then. Jane was, and is amazed at the number of after school hour’s music teachers give to their communities.

Jane became the Executive Director of the Eastern Oregon Regional Arts Council/dba ArtsEast in 2000 where she enjoys providing arts services to the ten most eastern counties in Oregon. She has been employed by, or directing, non-profits for the past seventeen-years. Jane was on the founding boards of Oregon Rural Action and the Oregon Alliance for Arts Education where she practiced being on the other side of the non-profit equation.

Jane and Jim have six wonderful grown children and two energetic grandsons with whom they love spending time. They enjoy family camping trips as well as holiday gatherings. The whole family thrives on spending time outdoors and playing games. Jane’s favorite past time is walking around Morgan Lake.


Jim Howell

Jim was raised in the rural community of Lincoln, northwest of Salem, Oregon. He attended two of the last one-room, one-teacher schools – 1st-3rd grades at Zena School and 4th-6th grades at Lincoln School.

Upon graduating from South Salem High School in 1967, he attended the University of Southern California – his most famous classmate was O.J. Simpson.  Jim completed his undergraduate program with a Bachelor of Arts in Music in 1971.

From there Jim engaged in a wide variety of occupations, none of which were music related. The longest lasting of these was as a residential and commercial carpenter in the Eugene-Springfield area.

Jim enrolled at the University of Oregon in the spring of 1985 and received his Oregon teaching certificate in 1986.  His first teaching job entailed doing all music K-12 in Condon, Oregon.

The following year Jim moved to La Grande to teach high school band and is currently completing his 22nd year there - the only job he has ever held for longer than eighteen months.  From 1987 through 1989 he earned a Masters of Arts in Teaching Music from Lewis & Clark College.

Jim served as Treasurer on the OMEA Board of Control from 1993 until 2000, when he was elected 1st Vice President in charge of the 2002 OMEA Conference, serving after that as President and Immediate Past President until 2006.  

Jim met Jane while serving on the founding board of the Oregon Alliance for Arts in Education during the mid-1990’s.  They married in the fall of 1999.  Jane and Jim enjoy six grown children and two grandchildren.

Jim enjoys family time and outdoors – hiking, backpacking, mountaineering, canoeing.

Jim will be teaching halftime at La Grande High School in the fall of 2009.