Montgomery County Community College faculty members and a student are being praised for their efforts to help Latinx students in Norristown learn to play the guitar.

Doug Ellis, of Lansdale, a student in the Sound Recording and Music Technology (SRT) Program at MCCC and founder of the nonprofit organization “No Strings Attached Guitars,” donated two three-quarter-sized and four full-sized acoustic guitars and cases to Centro de Cultura Arte Trabajo y Educacion, the Center for Culture, Art, Training and Education (CCATE) in Norristown.

“We were able to put together six guitars that worked for them,” said Ellis. “We’ll give another six in the next six months, as they get into the program.”

CCATE, according to its website, is nonprofit organization whose mission is to “… ignite social transformation by developing the talents of and empowering the Latinx community through culture, art, career development, and education.”

The organization is run by Founder and Executive Director Obed Arango, a former MCCC Anthropology instructor and Mustangs soccer coach, and a current faculty member at the School of Social Policy and Practice of the University of Pennsylvania

Before the pandemic CCATE had launched digital music production and guitar lesson classes.

“After the pandemic, both classes were interrupted, for obvious reasons,” said Arango. “Both classes are returning, we have more demand for students for guitar. We had three guitars and we needed six more.”

Ellis, a computer software salesman for Salesforce, said he was excited to help the CCATE students when he learned about the problem.

No Strings Attached was launched during the pandemic, Ellis explained. In the early days of lockdown with nothing to do, the woodworker and father of five, four of whom play guitar, decided it might be fun to learn how to restore used guitars.

“I wouldn’t mind doing this as my side gig,” he said. “I didn’t want to start a business to sell guitars. I wanted to find a way to give back to the community.”

Arango said the guitars arrived promptly after his first conversation with Computer Science Professor Kendall Martin, who runs “Beatz by Girls.”

Arango appreciated all of the work from MCCC faculty and Ellis for making his dream for more guitars a reality.

No Strings Attached Guitars continues to seek used guitars or donations to purchase instruments.

Learn more at NoStringsAttachedGuitars.org.

Sound recording technology at Montgomery Count Community College.