HS Band Parents- how much does it cost you?

It's been many yrs since DD was in band..I do remember 2 trips to WDW that cost more than our whole family to go. A trip to New York City and the Bahamas. Yes there was fund raisers that paid for part of the trip. I just recently found out where almost $300o went of DD's savings...she paid for a very good friend of mine DD to go on 1 of their band trips because the girl was not going to get to go.

I don't think anyone has mentioned the cost of following the band all over the state every Saturday for at least 9 weeks it may have been more. the gas to drive maybe 200 miles or more the cost of getting into the competions and having to eat out at least once if not twice that day.

I will say I usually knew where an what DD was doing because she was at band. They practiced 5 days a week no less than 3 hrs a day usually had to be on bus on Saturdays by 6 am sometimes earlier, never got home before 8 pm an sometimes not till after midnight, during marching season.

DD had 1 week in the summer with NO Band practice which really limited our vacation time as a family.
 
dyna said:
I don't think anyone has mentioned the cost of following the band all over the state every Saturday for at least 9 weeks it may have been more. the gas to drive maybe 200 miles or more the cost of getting into the competions and having to eat out at least once if not twice that day.
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Yes every Saturday we spend money on gas to travel, money to get in the competition, and then food while we are there. Every Saturday my husband rolls his eyes at me and ask if we have to go every single competition. I just look at him and say "Yes". I will miss the competitions when my kids are older. There are only four short years of high school.
 
I live in NOVA, the marching band materials fee is $125, uniform fee is $50. winter concert season is $50. Shoes and shirts you purchase as needed. The band trip is about $400/year, but you can fundraise individually and it is optional. No other costs for competitions or travel for that, other than food. Wow, that is pretty cheap! They are an excellent band with great school support.
 
STLDisney_Freak said:
Yes every Saturday we spend money on gas to travel, money to get in the competition, and then food while we are there. Every Saturday my husband rolls his eyes at me and ask if we have to go every single competition. I just look at him and say "Yes". I will miss the competitions when my kids are older. There are only four short years of high school.
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That's awesome that you go to everyone. It will mean so much to your child. When I was in band in HS, my parents didn't come to the competitions. My Dad generally worked on Saturdays and my mom didn't want to "waste" her whole Saturday to watch us march for 10 minutes. It really hurt to be one of the only kids who didn't have their parents there.
 


The band director and assistant director are paid by the school district. There is no fee for concert band which is a class. Fall marching band involved fees as did winter drum, guard, and winds. Our drum coaches and guard coaches plus any extra instrument coaches had to be paid by the boosters. We had to pay the truck driver and the bus driver plus the fuel. The county sprang for the bus. Although if we had to leave before the routes were done for a game on Friday, we had to charter.

For marching the first year fall fees were $1,000 of which you had to pay $500 and raise 500. You also were required to serve on a committee such as meals, sewing, snack bar, etc.
They went down by $250 the next year and stayed there.
The winter fees varied. I think Drum line was $1200 its most expensive year, $500 its least. I think the guard was $1500 at its most expensive, $500 its least. Winter winds was $200 or so. They always did the circuit. But sometimes they did other more expensive things and sometimes not.
 
dyna said:
I don't think anyone has mentioned the cost of following the band all over the state every Saturday for at least 9 weeks it may have been more. the gas to drive maybe 200 miles or more the cost of getting into the competions and having to eat out at least once if not twice that day.
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I was actually thinking this when I replied with my DS's fees. In four years we only missed one show, and that was because of a family wedding. There was also Spirit Wear to buy! Our fee covered one t-shirt, but there was always sweatshirts, section shirts, pins, pictures, etc.

He did two trips during his four years. That was extra. We live in Indianapolis, so we are lucky and just drive downtown for BOA events.
 
Marching band and band class are two different things here...marching band cost a lot of money. (Bus fees, uniform fees, food, competition fees etc.)
 


Our schools band doesn't do the "circuit" of competitions, but they still take marching band pretty seriously. There are around 250 kids in the program and my son loves everything about it, and the girl has already auditioned to be on teh color guard for it next year because it looked like so much fun.

The only costs are around $200ish for the uniform, 35 for the shoes. The kids are given tshirts, there are lots of summer band camp practices but there are no fees for any of that. There are no fees for travel - which only happens to football games when the team keeps winning and the one big competition they do each year. Boosters cover food for those days as needed. The uniforms are wool kilts and heavy coats and so we do have to pay to have them dry cleaned pretty much every week during marching season, but the places in town keep it under $10 each time which is nice.

Band is going on atrip to California next fall, they're estimating the cost to be between 1500-1700 per kid.
 
My daughter does not play an instrument, but she was in color guard this past fall as a freshman. Our required fees were $550 ... I don't have a breakdown handy, but I believe close to $100 of that was for color guard specific stuff. We were told at the new parent meeting that our fees were low for the type of band we have (competitive marching band, so they attend invitationals, etc.) and it was due to all the fundraising events held by the band. There were a lot of other incidentals that came up as well, but I didn't keep track of those. This was my first year as a band parent, so I'm not really familiar with marching band in general, but our program seems to be well run and the students appear to be well trained. My daughter had a terrific experience, so it was well worth it IMO
 
FlightlessDuck said:
Parents get into high school football games for free? Because that's what I was talking about when I said we had to pay for season passes. And competition tickets.
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The only parents that got in free at our school were snack bar, hospitality, and chaperones. For the away games, only the chaperones got in free. The rest of the parents all paid. It was $8. For the contests, only a limited number of chaperones got in free. Those were $10-$30.
 
We have a super competitive band program here. The high school program is just one band program meaning you have to be in both marching and concert bands. Band camp in the summer is about $425 per student and most have to have their own instruments barring the large instruments such as tuba, percussion instruments, etc. Otherwise it is incidentals like clarinet reeds, a few pieces such as a white shirt for concerts, etc.

We do have multiple fundraisers throughout the year. Our school district is generous regarding funding but the program is so extensive that they have fundraisers all the stinking time. They like to tell us that in order to provide the program they do we need to raise $60,000 per year. Some are traditional fundraisers like selling wrapping paper and whatnot. Others are less traditional such as selling reserved seating at concerts for $20 each (that one chaps my butt. Having to pay for seats to watch your kid perform in the spring concert). I have mixed feelings. It is a great program but sometimes their priorities are a bit skewed.
 
DisneyHardin said:
That's awesome that you go to everyone. It will mean so much to your child. When I was in band in HS, my parents didn't come to the competitions. My Dad generally worked on Saturdays and my mom didn't want to "waste" her whole Saturday to watch us march for 10 minutes. It really hurt to be one of the only kids who didn't have their parents there.
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People asked me why I attended every game and contest.
The answer is because you only have so many chances. And when they are gone, they are gone.
 
Turn the Page said:
Others are less traditional such as selling reserved seating at concerts for $20 each (that one chaps my butt. Having to pay for seats to watch your kid perform in the spring concert).
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I know the feeling. For our daughter's dance studio, not only do you pay for the expected things like the lessons, rehearsal time, choreography, competition fees, and dance costumes, but you have to buy tickets to the recital too. The one that is really odd for me is that they do the Nutcracker for the town (and schools) every year and charge everyone (both parents/family and public) to attend, but as parents, we also have to pay costume rental fees.

I cannot complain too much though, my daughter loves dance, and we love watching her enjoy it. She is basically doing aerobic activity 3-4 hours a day - I wish I could say I did a fraction of that! And, the Nutcracker has become a nice holiday tradition for us.

I guess most any activity for the kids can get expensive. I don't remember it being that way as a kid, but I guess I was not paying attention.
 
None. My son's school doesn't have a marching band. Our marching season is Mardi Gras but the school makes money off of it. Uniforms are dry cleaned by the school. But I paid nothing.
 
We are looking at around $850 for this year. I personally think that is insane and don’t know how lower income families afford it, especially the ones with more than one kid in band.
 
Elle23 said:
We are looking at around $850 for this year. I personally think that is insane and don’t know how lower income families afford it, especially the ones with more than one kid in band.
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Wondering the same. I wonder if some schools have scholarships for low income kids who would likely not be able to participate if it weren’t for that.
 
DD's HS wanted $200 at the start of the year. Then there's all the extra they ask for throughout the year. An annual trip that ran about $200, shoes as needed that were about $60-80 (luckily her feet haven't grown much in HS so we haven't bought those in a while), annual t-shirts at about 30, donations of water or other stuff they could use at competitions throughout the year. We have to pay $5-10 to see the two concerts they do in winter and spring. There's also random donations they ask for, like if they need money towards props or a golf cart.

Sounds like compared to a lot of schools we got off easy! I don't think I'd be able to afford some of the schools. I know at our school there are families that don't pay and there aren't any consequences. Not everyone can afford it.
 
As I mentioned earlier, my DD isn't in the band yet (signed up for next year though)... so I don't exactly know what to expect. But we just got info on the big band trip that they're doing during the 20/21 school year -- to London. The FAQ said they haven't finalized pricing yet, but the last time they did this trip, it was $3200/person. Yikes!
 
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