Just three days after launching a fundraiser to allow Yelm High School’s band program to return to a full schedule, booster club YHS Connects successfully raised over $4,200 to donate to Yelm Community Schools for the band program.
YHS Connects, a 501c3 non-profit organization, officially launched the fundraiser after the Yelm Tornados football team’s season opener against Mount Tahoma on Thursday, Sept. 5. Because of cuts made after Yelm Community Schools’ recent levy failure, Yelm High School’s band program was forced to sit out from the Tornados’ season opener against Mount Tahoma.
Though the Tornados defeated the Thunderbirds, 42-34, the band’s absence was noticeable. It didn’t perform the team’s fight song after each of Yelm’s six touchdowns, and the band’s traditional rendition of John Denver’s “Country Roads, Take Me Home” was also returned to the artist over the stadium speakers due to the band’s absence.
Kait Toompas, YHS Connects president, said she heard from many community members about how much the band was missed during the contest.
“We weren’t going to set [a fundraising] amount until we were there on Thursday night. There were so many community members that said football needs band. We tried to calculate, more or less, what half of the band program cost last year. We chose $4,200, and that was our initial goal,” Toompas said. “We found out on Aug. 21, even though negotiations were still going on for contracts, that the marching band was likely going to be cut. We started discussing there what we’d be able to do for fundraising. We already knew with the levy failure and band being an extracurricular activity, that was probably going to be affected.”
Following the conclusion of the non-conference matchup, YHS Connects and Toompas launched the fundraiser. She said the non-profit reached out to the school district in order to learn the exact amount of money needed to be raised, and YCS officials said they’d get back to them. But due to a high volume of requests coming in, the district said it could take “some time” to provide a specific amount, Toompas said.
Before the YCS school year began, Toompas said YHS Connects received an email from the high school band director Scott Pierson, listing the specific line items that were cut completely from the contract’s language.
According to Toompas, these cuts included: August’s marching band camp, reducing concert performances from three to one; reducing performances to two home football games instead of attending all; performing at only four home basketball games instead of all; no postseason performances for sports; no allocation for after-school marching band rehearsals; and no Christmas in the Park performance.
“The expectation [was] that the band will only play in the stands for two football games. That’s the majority of what band is for. They have band class, but then that’s the fun part — getting to do all the extra stuff,” Toompas said. “It affects a lot of kids because the marching band is as large as it’s been in five years at least. We don’t want to lose any kids who have a passion for music, and we decided that we’d start fundraising.”
After community members met YHS Connects’ goal of $4,200 in just three days, Toompas said the support from donors was amazing.
“We were really surprised by the response of the community and totally blown away by how quickly it was met. We didn’t think it was going to go that quickly at all,” she said. “Sometimes, it feels like the kids take a little bit of the backseat, and so it was surprising and endearing to see how much it means to the community.”
Toompas said that YHS Connects doesn’t have enough manpower to support all the YHS clubs seeking help through fundraisers, adding that many clubs have reached out to the non-profit in the past several days asking how their club can begin a fundraiser.
“As a booster club, we’re an umbrella. We’re made up of a main board, and then committees. This fundraiser was run by the band committee, and we’re now putting together a choir committee,” Toompas said. “These other committees need to be run by parents, not students. Parents would work with an ASB adviser. If there’s any parents that want to see their kids’ clubs succeed, we want to help. They can reach out to us.”
Community members interested in joining a YHS Connects committee can reach out to the non-profit on Facebook, or through email at YHSConnects@gmail.com.
