Purple Haze
You have to go to practice because you scheduled it
By Lauren Bagian

Jan. 28, 2010

I have a computer program called Microsoft Calendar and it pretty much helps me survive. Every practice, appointment and class is scheduled on the little grid with its little boxes for each hour of each day. About twice a week, there is a little red box from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. that is labeled “Pep Band,” and that is a very important box, to me at least.

The Northern High School Pep Band is a student run ensemble that plays for various sporting events that take place at the high school, usually volleyball and basketball games and the occasional pep rally. A scaled down version of the classic full-size band that plays “stand-tunes” and fight songs at football games, the pep band has about 15 players on any given night and sometimes even less.

This year, I jumped head-first into directing the pep band, and I got blown away quickly over how much organization it took. As the standard type-A personality, I made a bunch of schedules and lists outlining the times of the games, the times of the practices, who came when and to which game, and so forth. Of course, that system lasted for about a week, and then the day of every game became a scramble to get organized, to get players and have a balanced ensemble. Sometimes everyone wanted to come and other times it was like pulling teeth to get musicians in the bleachers. There were even times when I was ready to end the pep band season right then and there because it was getting too stressful. I’m very glad that I didn’t.

There is something that you learn while being in charge of something that you couldn’t possibly learn while simply being involved. Something that is very important to you may not be important to others, or they may like to do things that you don’t. Coming to a practice an hour early may not be at the top of everyone’s list of fun ways to spend a Friday night. The number one thing you should learn while being a leader, preferably before, is: yelling is never the answer. Crazy I know, but true.

Stress is one thing; you live with it, to some of us, it’s our air, but you should always have a really good reason for quitting something that you started, and in my mind there are not many good reasons. Even though I had a couple instances this year where I was ready to scream and pull out my hair, directing the Pep Band has been a great learning experience. I know it has been a far from perfect leadership, and things go that way most of the time, but in the long run, isn’t it better to look back and know that you tried?