The Yellow Board

SMC Results Deniers

Posted by Olde byr than dirt on 11/9/2022, 11:59 am

Standing on the sidelines it's easy to deny judges results. We all have our own likes and dislikes.In this day of internet bashings everyone anonymously gives their 2 cents worth and then some. Not me. No matter how wrong I feel the judging may have gone I respectfully and silently disagree. I think more folks should do the same. If you are in a position of selecting judges you can help the situation in future events and remove the judges in question!

Re: SMC Results Deniers

Posted by Or on 11/9/2022, 1:25 pm, in reply to "SMC Results Deniers"

How about we just train the judges better?

How about no more non-TMAA members judging?

how about we fix the problem rather than a consequence of the problem?

Re: SMC Results Deniers

Posted by BD on 11/9/2022, 5:06 pm, in reply to "Re: SMC Results Deniers"

Just having TMAA members judge is NOT going to fix the problem. Some of the worst judges I've experienced (including this year's area contest) were TMAA judges. I do agree thought that judges need to be better trained but ultimately we've got to figure out a way so that directors with a history of high quality bands are able to judge our contests.

Re: SMC Results Deniers

Posted by Respectfully on 11/11/2022, 12:06 pm, in reply to "Re: SMC Results Deniers"

Most of the judges with a history of high quality bands are themselves taking their bands to these contests, especially since area and now SMC will be annual events.

Does that mean we hire from fine arts directors and people who have left the profession to work for advocacy groups or industry groups? Or from out of state?

Or is the solution to hire solely retired directors? Personally, I find my least helpful comments in the past few years have come from judges that don't know what being in a classroom is like in a post-COVID world.

Or do we do the unthinkable and have region and area contests be pushed back to early October?

Or .. here's a radical thought. Move state marching contest so that it occurs the last week of November? Or even just a week later than it already does?

If we want "qualified directors" to be available, we can't have fifteen area contests on the same weekend.

Re: SMC Results Deniers

Posted by Um on 11/15/2022, 7:14 am, in reply to "Re: SMC Results Deniers"

Good sounds are good sounds regardless of Covid. Everyone's go to response seems to be to "teach better". Maybe that's the answer. But in all seriousness, we cannot allow Covid to be an excuse for everything. Especially at this point. Covid impacted 1.5 years, (unless you were stuck in one of the forever closed districts). Recover, recruit, program, and keep the fundamentals fun. When WE get to choose the music sitting in front of the kids that best suits them we should be able to work around technique issues. Sure, there was a bad recruiting year and the year that never ended. Maybe schools only have 2 bands or 1 band going to UIL instead of 4. But at this point, there is no reason to not have quality sounds and a solid musical understanding to meet the rubric standards.

As far as marching, pick your show accordingly and don't feature weak sections. Wonder what the math teacher thinks as we get to pick our evaluation music based on our strengths and they have to teach what shows up......

Re: SMC Results Deniers

Posted by Respectfully on 11/15/2022, 2:32 pm, in reply to "Re: SMC Results Deniers"

Covid set band programs back most of a decade, whether you choose to believe it or not.

Ignoring EVERY OTHER ASPECT of child development right now, focus just on band.

In middle school:

Those kids in your 8th grade program right now? Many of them had a "virtual year" for 6th grade band. Did they learn what they should have?

Was last year a true NV JH band situation, or did kids have a TON of reteaching and relearning to do?

Now look at high school.

Your Seniors have had *most of one* year of a regular band situation - their FRESHMAN year. Freshman year, they went on Forever Spring Break. Sophomore year was Virtual Year. Junior year was last year - and NO ONE would or should claim last year was 100% back to normal. Now they're being expected to be the leaders of programs that they've never seen led outside of their freshman years. The Juniors now have to figure out all that stuff without having the years of development that they should have gotten. The underclassmen are just along for the ride.

To loop back in outside the band hall:

Every child lost, effectively, a year and a half of instruction due to Covid. You can claim "it's not a big deal" all you want but there's a reason the educational community is going insane about "learning loss" and why our national reading scores are the lowest they've been in recorded history right now. It's absolutely a real thing, and not an excuse.

Now multiply that by their mentality and their emotional maturity. Our Seniors have never completed a full REGULAR high school year - since last year was anything but regular for nearly everyone, given all the "devious licks" and other raised-by-iPads-and-TikTok junk that went on all year.

The rest of our high school kids? They act like middle school kids in bigger and older bodies. Current middle school kids act like elementary students. We talk a LOT about how there is a profound lack of maturity across the board in kids these days - the lack of true socialization for a year and a half (or more, in those forever closed districts, as you put it) has severely stunted our students' emotional growth.

So it's not an excuse. It's a reason. It's reality. And the sooner you learn to temper your expectations for what kids are capable of - and it's NOT what they were five years ago - the sooner you'll carry much less frustration with the profession.

And as for "2 or 1 bands going to UIL instead of 4" as you put it - that's exactly what I'm talking about. You're thinking in terms of big schools. What about at the small schools that STARTED WITH ONE BAND going to UIL? How are THEY dealing with it? What about those programs that DID NOT have 300 students? There's a TON more to think about in this state than the top end of 5A/6A.

Stop saying "oh, just teach to the rubric" - those schools that were struggling to achieve success on the rubric ALREADY are drowning now. I pity those inner city directors and medium school counterparts having to enter as Varsity ensembles when they earned that first on-stage first division three or four years ago. The healthiest and largest programs are keeping their heads above water - but from what I saw at SMC, nearly every program lost enrollment and lost quality from three-four-five years ago.

It's going to take time to bring things back to where they were. We're in year 4 of the Pandemic. I fully believe we won't be back to pre-Covid levels of performance as a band community until every kid who was in band during Covid graduates. We've got 5 years to go.

Re: SMC Results Deniers

Posted by Um on 11/17/2022, 8:16 am, in reply to "Re: SMC Results Deniers"

Not every school closed for that long. Many schools realized early on that they couldn't function remote and they went to school. The closer you were to a major metro area the more likely you were to stay closed longer.

Schools that were already struggling are now drowning? Or are just still struggling? Yes, schools that were down are having a little tougher time getting back up but chances are, they weren't magically on their way to Superior and Covid knocked them completely out. And no, I don't measure programs by their UIL. Some of the best teaching and students most in need of band are getting 4's by UIL standards. But they have great teachers and are learning so much more about life than that 4 would indicate. So maybe it is putting UIL ratings in their right place as part of this discussion as well.

If you follow this board much you would know kids have been getting worse and worse for the last 30 years. I've always said kids were kids. Are they more immature now than they were? Or are you older and less aware of how kids actually act? While you have aged 3 or 4 years the kids sitting in your classes have not. They are the same age they always have been. So I stand by teach to the rubric and teach to fundamental standards. I would argue the top 5 to 10 bands in nearly every classification sure aren't using that excuse. We have to stop accepting excuses. Put your goals in front of you, WRITE them down where everyone can see them and take one step at a time. And if the kids didn't help with those goals, you are wasting your time. Maybe it's time to evaluate partially what the kids want in a band program too. But that's a whole different discussion.

Re: SMC Results Deniers

Posted by BDSO on 11/15/2022, 8:26 pm, in reply to "Re: SMC Results Deniers"

I agree 100% with everything you said except the last part. I don't think we will get back to pre-COVID levels until every kid who participated in remote learning has graduated. That changed so many kids for the worse. Does your campus have an issue with kids skipping class? Mine does, and I've spoke with a lot of teachers at different campus and with different populations and socio-economic level and they do to. I will be you anything that the large majority of the kids skipping are the ones that were 100% remote. It's amazing how a single year has affected students so dramatically. Across the country, schools are seeing an increase in discipline issues and a drop in academic ability. It is foolish and arrogant to think the band hall is some how immune to this and that we can just "will" pre-COVID levels of dedication and performance into existence. It's refreshing to see others acknowledge. I've been in this business for 25 years and I don't see this going back to pre-March 2020 levels (in numbers or quality) for a while, if ever). Kids have changed. Families have changed. Schools have changed. Maybe it's time bands change.

Re: SMC Results Deniers

Posted by NLABD on 11/16/2022, 9:16 am, in reply to "Re: SMC Results Deniers"

There were a lot papers out about how the kids who were born during the pandemic are wired slighty differently too, so it may be a matter of evolving to the way things are going to be instead of thinking we'll go back to what we thought was normal.

But absolutely, I would expect kids who were beginners to be at a slight disadvantage throughout high school.

in the 2019-2020 school year, kids got essentially 75% of year.
2020-2021 - we were going to make up that 25% loss. BUT we were remote or hybrid. My beginners accomplished HALF of what I would normally expect in a year.

And then I retired, but the numbers weren't good, and I doubt I was the only one who saw something similar.

Re: SMC Results Deniers

Posted by What? on 11/17/2022, 8:22 am, in reply to "Re: SMC Results Deniers"

So we have already determined the 80 year outcome for kids that are 2 years old and have determined they are wired differently? Good grief. So many thoughts from that statement but I'll leave it at that. Sure glad nobody ever told me I was wired differently and would never accomplish anything.......

I remember a lot of research on beginner band students and where they ended up in 9th grade and it showed that kids that started in 6th, 7th, and even 8th grade ended up about the same place come 9th grade overall. So the beginners were behind in 6th or 7th grade. If they were a beginner in 8th grade (again or still) then they should catch up early in high school per that research.

Re: SMC Results Deniers

Posted by Citation needed on 11/18/2022, 2:08 pm, in reply to "Re: SMC Results Deniers"

Who conducted this research? When? Where? Who reviewed the methodology? Where was it published? When?

Re: SMC Results Deniers

Posted by Don't remember on 11/18/2022, 3:25 pm, in reply to "Re: SMC Results Deniers"

I don't remember. I just remember having a discussion about it, maybe even a TMEA clinic in the early 2000's. I came from a place where beginners started in 4th grade and couldn't believe my beginners in Texas didn't start until 6th or 7th grade and then stumbled on that info.

And in my own teaching I had 7th grade beginners over the years that in 9th grade were making the Varsity, NV, and SNV bands at a 6A high school. Best kid I ever started as a 7th grader was varsity Middle school in 8th grade and All region for 4 years in high school.

I wish I had the study but I don't.

Re: SMC Results Deniers

Posted by Respectfully on 11/16/2022, 11:44 am, in reply to "Re: SMC Results Deniers"

I'm finding that in many cases, the biggest change is that our kids who come from means are now acting like kids that don't come from means.

Our dual-income-dual-parent "white collar" families had to work from home from the pandemic - their kids were, effectively, babysat by electronic devices. Single-income families? Depends upon whether both parents worked.

Blue collar families have much the same situation as before, but there is a LOT more economic uncertainty now than there was. Evictions are WAY up - and only getting worse. People living "on the edge" are getting cut by that edge at this point.

We're going to be seeing the social and economic - societal, if you like - impact of COVID for the next twenty years in this country. It's just like the 1918 flu epidemic was part of what led to the stock market crash a year later, which strongly affected the economy until the middle of WW2.

If milk costs $5/gallon, low to middle income parents are going to start thinking twice about spending $20 a week on private clarinet lessons for little Jackson.

Re: SMC Results Deniers

Posted by Exercise on 11/17/2022, 10:41 am, in reply to "Re: SMC Results Deniers"

The stock market crashed in 1929. That's a full decade after the Spanish flu.

Re: SMC Results Deniers

Posted by Amen on 11/11/2022, 4:05 pm, in reply to "Re: SMC Results Deniers"

The lack of qualified judges available for area contests is a big reason we have unqualified bands showing up at SMC. (That and the fact that Regionals have become pass-fail). Just my opinion, I could be wrong.

Re: SMC Results Deniers

Posted by You mean on 11/17/2022, 8:06 am, in reply to "Re: SMC Results Deniers"

You mean like football teams making the playoffs and then losing in the first round by 60 points? You are saying we have too many participants? And well, Region should be pass fail. Either you march to a standard or you don't. Pretty cool thing about the rubric actually.

Re: SMC Results Deniers

Posted by older than dirt on 11/9/2022, 2:28 pm, in reply to "Re: SMC Results Deniers"

the issue is our human interferes. As we try to judge "aesthetics", we are distracted by our biases. Some people like blue, some like green. Beauty is very subjective. The idea of training our judges still infers that we can establish a "more right" way, and usually that "right way" is our own "right way. Step back and understand how the state marching contest has changed through the years and the effort that has been given to try to make it as fair as possible with the understanding of judging beauty. Congratulations to all of the participants and even those that did not advance because of human judgement that decided the results.

« Back to index

[ The Yellow Board ]