Odem Bands Leadership/Drum Line

Good evening, We had scheduled for two days of leadership training and drumline camp next week. In the interest of safety we are going to postpone those days for now on campus. Tuesday at 2pm I would like to have a virtual meeting with our leadership team over Zoom – I will provide more info and links via their Remind.

The events we are going through with this pandemic are unprecedented in our lifetimes. We strongly believe we would rather fall on the side of caution, than regret moving too quickly. When we do resume students will need to come with a signed OEISD COVID form, as well as wear masks at any time they are not playing an instrument, or actively engaged in activity that prevents that. The procedures we used for our drumline and guard camps will remain in place until further notice as far as screening and cleaning.

UIL has said they expect fall sports and activities to begin on time. For every parent/student please know that your health and safety is imperative to us. Students know that I have always had the philosophy of ‘Be There, Work Hard’ as one of the tenets of our program. Having full rehearsals is a key to the success we have had, but we do not want anyone to feel like they will be penalized this year. Rehearsals this summer are optional per UIL policies at this time. If a parent does not feel comfortable in sending a student – please contact me so we can try and keep in touch and know what’s going on. I completely understand your concerns if so!

I wish that I had a firm plan of answers, but we are going to take things one week at a time for right now with our published schedule. We will not add additional dates to those, and our first week of full band would be a bit different schedule for times than as is tradition. When we make it through next week I will provide some tentative information on that.

More than anything I wish you and your families well! Stay healthy!

Mr. Steven Rash
Director of Bands
Odem High School