weedyweidenthal

In my experience, it depends on the staff, but that was never done when I marched at Madison... 2007 Spirit it was commonly mentioned after the regional that the goal was to make finals. 2008 Madison, I think a lot of us had high expectations throughout camps and all days. Then when scores started rolling in it became apparent that we were fighting for finals and the membership knew that but it was never communicated from staff. We were just told to keep working hard and that year's staff pushed us really hard. In 2009, it was apparent early on that the show sucked. I think a lot of us thought we'd still make finals after all the changes, but staff never mentioned placements. In 2010 I think we all thought we were better than the scores reflected. Placement was never discussed as a goal but we were told by a brass staff member that we should care about the scores which was in conflict with a lot of the membership beliefs and with what we were told by the admins. Donnie VanDoren told me in a private conversation that his belief was that it should take 5 years for any hornline to build a program that competes for the Jim Ott award and that the corps could be a medalist within that same time span with the staff we had. Jim Mason also told me that he thought it would be 5 years to become a top corps. That was never pushed on the members but I think that kind of word had spread throughout the corps that it was the expectation and belief. I remember Jim's thing was "Play the game, win the game, change the game." In 2011 I think most of us thought we were getting gypped so no one really cared about the scores. That was the summer of a lifetime for me with the experiences we had performing that show in New York. I believe that the reason that the 5 year plans were never met was in large part due to the hole that had been dug in the previous few years and that the 2014 show was a step in the right direction even though the placements were stagnant. That show was significantly more difficult than the previous shows and really propelled the corps forward. I wish we could have seen Jim continue to design shows, but at least 2015 represented another step forward. Sadly, show design since then has been lacking. I have high hopes for J-Robb's tenure.

Music of James Brown, Don Ellis, Billie Eilish, Nina Simone, and Todd Terje... I’m excited!

Sure it could happen. I don’t believe it will, but we are 6 months away from the season, so I suppose time will tell.

Those jumps don’t happen without changes. The biggest problem a year ago was the design... there’s a new design team this year (and personally I have much greater confidence in the new program coordinator). I’m not saying it will happen but I certainly wouldn’t be willing to say that 8 corps have to fold to make it happen either. But more importantly, there’s just no reason for the negativity that prompted this exchange. Also, in 2010 we were coming off a 15th place season and had just performed a terrible show that coincided with a rough season for the members resulting in very few vets and a huge amount of guys that had never marched in any corps prior to 2010.

People were saying the same thing about us in 2010 before the show announcement. After the show announcement it got even worse. No need for the negativity. Jason has done a great job keeping everyone up to date with the progress and will offer reasonable critiques of certain areas when he does so. It sounds like things are going pretty well and knowing how dedicated Jason is to honing his skills and analyzing himself as an educator, there’s reasons to be optimistic.

Your feelings on the matter have been noted... Time and time again. It’s time to move on bro. We get it... you don’t approve of the direction of the corps.

If people are suggesting that Dann and Chris are liars and they didn't do it, then that's just another ridiculous statement to make with no knowledge of facts. In addition to official polling conducted by the corps, in October of 2017 Chad Hanes (better known as Chadwick Michael these days), an alumnus from 2007-2008, conducted polls. He gathered email addresses from every member that was on Corps Data (which is almost 100% of members since 2009 or so since it was required for us to use the site as members and a significant amount of older alums since it's constantly encouraged to update your info on the site) and sent polls. I was harshly critical of the manner in which Chad conducted the polls in part because it looked like official communication from the drum corps. I think it was about 130 members that responded from the 2017 edition of the corps with 90% in favor of going co-ed. The further back in the membership you went, the lower the participation rate and the lower the percentage of alums voting in favor of going co-ed. Around that time the Scouts were drafting an announcement that they were allowing transgender members and Chad released an article that was critical of the organization for discrimination. I talked with Steve Powers on 10/26/17 and he informed me that they were pushing up the announcement of allowing transgender members and I expressed that I would hope that the announcement wouldn't look like it was conceding to an alumnus that had gone rogue and attempted to put a stranglehold on the corps. That same day I talked with Kent Eversmeyer (1981-1984?) and he informed me that a vote was impending on whether or not to go co-ed and that current members had polled in favor of allowing women into the corps.

The members don’t matter? It’s THEIR drum corps and they asked for it.

It really doesn't matter if you say it 1 time or 100 times, you can still be wrong. The show design in recent years was below par. Most of us seem to agree on that. It held them back competitively. However, the statement you're making is not related to the competitiveness of the corps. You clearly don't know the leadership team if you make this statement. In fact, the issue of going co-ed goes back AT LEAST to my years in the corps in 2008-2011 and I would imagine it went back further considering that 2005 featured a female soloist... and so did 1971 with a few other female performers sprinkled in for exhibitions or parades between those years.

Yes, they do. And that's ok.

I did not participate in Greek life, but I am a member of the freemasons... an organization that does discriminate against women. What you are suggesting is that some forms of discrimination are ok. I agree with that statement, but where the disconnect exists here is with the discomfort of the word "discrimination." Just like any aspect of any decision in life, you should weigh pros and cons and make a decision. In this particular instance, the issue of discrimination against women was weighed on many levels. One of the ways it was evaluated was among the directors and another was with the members themselves who felt like women should be included in the drum corps. This is the current member's drum corps of which they should take ownership. My time is past, just like most of the people commenting on this. The current members and the current directors came to a conclusion that discrimination based on gender wasn't acceptable for them.

Yes, I would say that making the claim that the Scouts were looking to put a female drum major in place to make a statement is a terrible thing to say when you consider that it discredits the abilities of those young women to effectively do their job within the corps. Yes, I'm defensive about these kids because I want to see them have a positive experience and walk out of this as better people for having done so and your posts are detrimental to that cause. You also clearly don't know what Dann is all about and the importance that he places on having a positive impact on these young adults. No, I'm not at all offended. I'm disappointed that someone could be so adamantly wrong about something and not realize the negative consequences of your words.

I don’t think anybody involved in the organization is pleased with the competitive results, but that is a different discussion (that is certainly worth having) from what is being spouted here.

Nah, you’re dead wrong but you don’t want to actually get facts and discover that to be true. You want to hide behind a screen name speculating about a youth activity and make statements like this that are detrimental to the organization because you enjoy the controversy... otherwise, you would seek first hand information. What a pathetic way to live.

For what it's worth, I was in favor of the corps staying all-male. I'm still coming around to the idea of a co-ed Madison Scouts. However, I also know Chris and Dann pretty well and the lengths that some people are going to to accuse them of various acts is ridiculous. It's really easy to send either one of them an e-mail and get answers to your questions.