By MIKE COURSON
Great Bend Post
Disney classics have provided the soundtrack to many a childhood. With approval from the USD 428 Board of Education Monday night, the Great Bend High School band will now get to make its own music at Disney World in Orlando, Fla. GBHS Band Director Grant Mathews outlined a Spring Break trip for the upcoming school year for the board.
"Trips are a good way for the students to build camaraderie and give us a sense of our band family being together through shared experiences like those kinds of trips," he said. "Then it gives us a chance to take what we do here locally, whether it's performing parades or outreach things, and expanding that into some other world, like Disney World."
The band last traveled to Kansas City as part of a 3-day trip right before the COVID-19 pandemic. With Monday's approval, the band will now join the 3-year rotation with other pieces of the music department at GBHS.
"By the time they got back from the trip, everything had shut down," Mathews said. "We haven't been on any excursions since then. We had a discussion about getting back to a good rotation of trips with the music department."
Mathews liked the direction of taking a trip every two years instead of every three years, but making the trips larger. The upcoming trip to Orlando will include approximately 60 band students and eight sponsors. The trip will include playing some Disney hits and Kansas classics during a march down Main Street of the Magic Kingdom. Mathew is also trying to secure a jazz band performance at Universal Studios. The trip will also include a stop at Kennedy Space Center and a local beach.
"It's a lot to cram into one trip," said Mathews, "but if you're going to drive that far once in a while, you want to get as much out of it as you can.
Mathews reached out to two charter companies for travel accommodations. Each student will need to come up with approximately $1,950 to make the trip. Planned fundraisers included poinsettia and popcorn sales, a recent candy bar fundraiser, a chili supper, and a potential garage sale-type event in the future.
"Our top fundraisers have maybe $300-400 in their account right now," Mathew said, "so it's going to be a quick, short, hard stretch to get all that money together."