mjoakes

Disappointed in the Cavies. Maybe a little frustrated. For me, nothing much coherent here. Funs stuff - but things kind of fun from the past just placed into the show. Cavies always had a great way of distinguishing the guard. Not so this year. Some good synched flag moments. Overall, the show looks tired. Or maybe I am just projecting.

Me, too. Getting so tired of yoga and rap wear. And they show you can be modern-looking and still connect to tradition.

Blue Stars are always too visually busy for me. And always drunk on props that just don't add value. That's not an anti-props comment. I think BS just messes up the field with them. But I enjoyed listening to them.

Cadets sounded great throughout. after a terrific opening, i didn't really catch on to what was going on.

Nicely done, Colts. As someone posted, this was a noticeable step up.

Did that featured guard person hang herself in the oil derrick? I glanced it very quickly and might be weirdly wrong.

And they work so hard on the Rosemont branding.

Great place to watch a lot of drum corps. Very hot, of course. But the venue is walkable from hotels and restaurants. I much prefer that arrangement than the need to drive and park.

Small thing: Crossmen right after Madison illustrates for me how much a difference the right contrast in corps vs guard uniforms can make. Madison was all a bit bland - though I like the green tops and headgear. Crossmen look very sharp colors-wise. Flags standout out nicely so far.

First time seeing Madison and on Flo. Music sounded better to me than the last few years. I didn't understand anything about the show, however. Not a DCI intellectual, so the ball/eye thing rolling around was lost on me. Liked the corps unis, nothing noteworthy about the guard. Good for them if this is an improving show and another step in the long-term rebuild.

Your entire post was thoughtful. I think an important point here, though, is that some people don't agree that the ship is being turned around. That isn't a ridiculous position. They might be wrong. But you can't ask anyone to support the corps unwaveringly if they have reasonable doubts about the leadership.

I had to struggle to understand what this was. Now that I do, I'm not sure what to make of it. The dumb youngsters from Infinity acted stupid, apparently, and this SCV person is responsible? Maybe she's a bad leader, maybe not. I don't know. As a former advisor to a 180-member college fraternity, and a former faculty member guiding 20-year olds to Hong Kong and Japan, I understand that sometimes my very best efforts, and as much coaching and wisdom as I could muster, were sometimes not enough to prevent some idiot students from going off rails.

I’ve read your passionate posts throughout this mess and wondered if my corny joke might offend. Appreciate your good attitude and funny response.

All this SCV news and detail leaves me confused: Are the clowns being sent in or sent away?

Thanks for the link. Very cool idea. This, and the announcement of the tour change, leaves me with a good impression of JS leadership.

The activity is going to survive. I think what's often being considered here on DCP is whether that survival is of a form that any particular poster likes.

Google results tell me that's about $1,459 in today's dollars. Not trivial. Memory is really hazy, but it seems to me I needed something like $800 for everything all summer - fees, travel, food, misc. expenses. Plus, and again, not earning any money through summer jobs, which helped pay for college. Whatever amount it was, memory is not hazy that it seemed impossibly out-of-reach.

I know others have answered this. I'll add: My nonprofit invests all the time, but mostly short-term, low risk money market stuff to earn some tiny interest on cash that isn't needed next week. We have occasionally done long-term CDs earning slightly higher interest timed for maturity when we know we will need the cash. We don't buy Tesla or crypto. Any nonprofit investments should be guided by a written policy approved by the board, as the OP suggested he wrote.

Really fascinating reading. Thanks to the OP for bringing to this group some expertise and detailed knowledge.

BITD, I investigated marching for a corps for each of two summers and couldn't swing it because of the cost. Not just the actual costs, but giving up the summer jobs I needed to pay for any of my personal expenses. That's the 1970s. I'm sympathetic to someone who has the passion and talent to march but can't afford it. At the same time, it's not literally true that only recently has drum corps fees priced people out of the activity. Almost no matter the fees, some potential members won't be able to afford it.

Maybe. I appreciate you trying to be nice. But that board also could imply they haven't done the kind of due diligence and business planning needed upfront to lay the groundwork to be successful.

I attended an SCV board meeting back in June 2018. Just as an observer. Nice people, nicely welcoming me. I hit a few California shows that year, including a great show at Stanford. Have never been able to get photos to work on DCP. Is it really a complicated thing to let us drop in images instead of using links? My Google links won't result in displaying the photo. https://photos.app.goo.gl/NEWX9PQs2HRyiv2XA

Miscellaneous thoughts after watching: 1. I'm impressed that they made this decision. It must have been very tough for all kinds of reasons. 2. Currency value as a factor? Oh, c'mon. This musical arts nonprofit is affected significantly by exchange rates? Probably something there for him to create a bullet item for it; I just can't fathom it. 3. Vendor debt sounds like money the organization owes to suppliers. But that seems like a strange way to describe their payables. Or maybe my head is stuck in a textbook too much. 4. Did he say $70,000 in fundraising? That's pennies. If they double that in the short-term, it doesn't accomplish much. 5. The inflation story. Geeze. @Jeff Ream described it as amateur hour. Yes. Everyone is affected by this. (And the COVID story, too.) All the other corps are affected by it in almost the same kinds of ways. I'll give them a break because of the travel schedule from a California base. But then there needs to be an explanation for how BD, Mandarins, and others worked with this without the same tragic consequences. 6. The steps they are taking seem okay to me. Evaluating all parts of their operations, looking for new funding. (Good luck on getting big sponsors, though. Have they called Cook in Bloomington? Ha.) And I appreciate this effort to communicate with everyone. It's easy to poke fun at or question things we don't fully understand (because we don't have all the information). But these folks are under great pressure in a very stressful situation. I wish them the best. And I have fingers crossed that exchange rates will move around in 2023 in a way that benefits a drum corps.

It partly is, of course. But you have boards to establish policy and oversight so that one person doesn't bring things down. The current SCV situation, including the revolving door of staff of the past few years, is entirely the fault of the board. It is the job of board members to ensure any organization functions properly, meets clearly defined goals (strategic and operational), and is sustainable.

I know you're coming at this with good intentions and some creative thinking. But asking current DCI board people to get involved in helping out SCV board people sounds like a mess to me. The SCV board members ought to be grown up enough to seek out help on their own, if they need it. I know it seems like they obviously need it, but I'm assuming they are involved in some sort of study, reflection, and discussion right now anyway. Their situation is way too embarrassing for them not to be.