6 Quick Tips for Improving Your Marching Band Recruitment

Today’s post is from guest blogger, Emily Palmer. Emily is a recent graduate of Eastern Michigan University where she served as Color Guard Captain for the EMU Marching Band. During her time at EMU she also served as President of the Gamma Rho chapter of Tau Beta Sigma. She now serves as the Color Guard Instructor for Farmington HS. We’re so glad she can join us to impart some of the wisdom gleaned from her time as a Marching Band Student Leader!

My little high school marching band students are in the midst of recruiting new members for the 2012 season.  Our program is relatively small and under-recognized by the school, so I really want them to get into the habit of spreading good information about themselves.  In order to help them realize how effective they can be, I recently shared the following tips with them, all of which were gleaned from my experience in the EMU Marching Band and Tau Beta Sigma.  As the recruiting season for concert and marching band draws near (and therefore recruitment for Tau Beta Sigma, Kappa Kappa Psi, Sigma Alpha Iota, Mu Phi Epsilon and Phi Mu Alpha), I urge you to search for a way to apply some (or all) of these to your own programs.[…]

Thank You to Tau Beta Sigma!

I’m taking a quick break from the usual posts on Lead In Step to share my thanks for Tau Beta Sigma. I was very honored to be asked by TBΣ’s National President to submit an article for the Spring 2012 Issue of Kappa Kappa Psi and Tau Beta Sigma’s joint publication, The Podium. These two organizations are long-standing college band service organizations with particular relevance to the challenges of today’s band student leaders. The Podium has been in publication since 1947, and though it contains content mostly targeted to the membership of these two organizations, it is still a great honor to have my writing published in print in a magazine in its 65th year![…]

Welcome to Lead In Step!

Welcome to Lead In Step–The Student Leader’s Guide to Building a Better Band!

Join us in the coming weeks and months as we explore relevant leadership topics for marching band and concert bands. It’s our hope that here you’ll find new ideas, an exciting conversation, and realistic strategies for making your band a more effective group. Spend less time struggling and more time doing what you love to do–making beautiful music.

Soon, you’ll find several different kinds of posts here on Lead In Step. Whether short Quick Tips, Reflections on current events, basic leadership topics, or deep discussions, we hope you will find something surprisingly useful.[…]