<p>My son will be in the USC Marching Band - looking for some help with the following two quesitons:
1) According to the USC website, Marching Band camp starts on August 13 - he is also a freshman music major and applied to the music LLC. We are helping my son move up from FL, so need to plan time off from work, etc. Does anyone know when he can actually move into his dorm room? Are we able to move him in PRIOR to the 13th (for example the 11th or 12th), or are we stuck with that day only? It will be complicated for us with two full cars, as the drive is 6.5 hours.
2) Does anyone know how to obtain away game football tickets? We live in Orlando and would love to see our son march at the swamp, but the UF website says tickets are already sold out for this game. Looking for a pair or 4....does SC offer away game tickets for sale?</p>
<p>On the football games, I don’t believe that SC has access to away game tickets except for bowl games. That said, it is fairly likely that the UF website is incorrect. Last year when I was investigating tickets I found that lots of sites had gibberish information on their websites until they had the real information. It may just be too early for UF to post the correct info. Most colleges haven’t even started selling tickets yet. Don’t worry too much about it, I am sure that you will get tickets - one way or another.</p>
<p>I seriously doubt that band students will be able to move in earlier than the stated day, and most likely they will be moving into the Courtroom Mariot and will only have an hour or two to drop their stuff of at their dorm room. </p>
<p>If the music community is at the same dorm they were at last year, the rooms are tiny (despite being apartment style) and he needs to bring almost nothing other than instruments/books, one set of bed linens, shorts, tshirts, underwear, and maybe a keyboard (my son found it very helpful to have his keyboard in his dorm room for music theory and aural skills classes). Also, the school will provide some tshirts (band, and the music community, and the housing dept and the alumni association - he got like 6 free tshirts during the first couple of weeks), and a ball cap.</p>
<p>My son brought a tv but never ever watched it and ended up bringing it back home just to get it out of the way. Marching band students (and music majors in general) stay very very very very busy. Oh yea, a laptop and a printer can come in handy also.</p>
<p>I suspect that the regular move in day is going to be on the 18th (the next Sat). It is possible that the band students may be given some time off that morning to straighten out their dorm rooms. I know that you don’t want to make too trips in less than a week, but we went on regular move in day last year and spend the day exploring Columbia on our on when he was at band practice, and went shopping for groceries and those few extra’s that he had forgot. Then we helped him lug the stuff up to his room between band breaks (not much time).</p>
<p>Due to our work schedule, we did not go with him on that bandcamp move in day - I felt guilty about it, but it worked out fine.</p>
<p>We called the school, talked to both housing and band. It’s complicated for us, because we’re a 6.5 hour drive and he is bringing his car to school. Bottom line, we’re going up on the 12th to move him in between 8-10 am on the 13th. He reports to band camp at 11 am.</p>
<p>He moves into the hotel, and can’t get in to the dorm again until the 17th because that is when the RA’s move in.</p>
<p>They didn’t recommend we come back for the 17-18. They said its a madhouse, and they can’t guarantee we would even see him again during the day. Its simply not worth us making that drive and hoping to catch an hour with him, so we will need to make the 2 hours on the 13th count. We will be back for parents weekend the following month.</p>
<p>You probably won’t see him at parents day either - depending on what time the football game is. If it is an evening game band will take up the entire day because they will practice in the AM then parade all afternoon, then the game will last 4 hours or so. Maybe you will be able to take him to breakfast.</p>
<p>Parents day can still be a lot of fun if you want to socialize with other parents (that you don’t know). Plan to stay until Sunday and do breakfast and/or church with him Sunday Morn.</p>
<p>Yep, we don’t expect to see him all that much, especially on Saturday. However, we’re heading up on Thursday as there is a symphony concert that night, assuming he makes it into that ensemble. We are just planning to spot him in the band, which will be cool enough - I went to an SEC school myself, and the traditions on football Saturday are just awesome to be a part of, so looking forward to having fun cheering on the Gamecocks. Socializing with parents can be interesting and entertaining as well, and we will meet up on Sunday morning before we head out of town.</p>