<p>No, son's band will be there for Spring Break in March. Didn't know that Pearl City marching band will be there this year too. but that's great. I know that Kalani & Kaiser enjoyed their previous trips to Sydney & know my son's HS will also.</p>
<p>I was not saying that they were going, but I know that the Pearl City band is one of the largest around, and we (in high school) only go abroad for marching band trips, not for concert band.</p>
<p>Our kids' HS goes abroad for orchestra, hula, language classes, history classes & their small marching band (that has fewer than 100 members)--maybe a few other trips that I'm not aware of as well. When they play at Sydney, they're just going to perform a concert & not marching. They're also going to play at a school. As I understand, it's not easy to qualify to play at the Sydney Opera House, they're pretty selective & the HS band director was happy the band was chosen.</p>
<p>I kinda really love my high school...</p>
<ol>
<li><p>When the KU basketball team shows up at your game (that happened last night).</p></li>
<li><p>When the head principal knows most people's names (pop: ~1300).</p></li>
<li><p>When the journalism department gets a flyer for a contest involving "standing up for the first amendment in the face of censorship" and the news adviser says, "Oh, throw that out now; we'll never be censored."</p></li>
<li><p>When the lunch ladies hang a sign in the cafeteria that says, "Spicy chicken: Holy Grail of school lunch" (and the students agree).</p></li>
<li><p>When the D.A. tries to shut down the open lunch policy, every teacher and administrator in the building rolls their eyes.</p></li>
<li><p>When you win your school's 100th State Championship (girls gymnastics 2005).</p></li>
<li><p>When the teachers are on an intramural basketball team called "Staff Infection," and they win the tournament.</p></li>
<li><p>When the Latin teacher/former D1 football player breaks up a fight in the hallway wearing a toga</p></li>
<li><p>When everyone watches Saved By the Bell in the cafeteria before class in the mornings and BET during lunch</p></li>
<li><p>When you print school t-shirts that say "Business in the front and party in the back: Fear the mullet," and everyone in school, including the principal, wears it.</p></li>
<li><p>When seniors are exempt from second semester finals if they have good attendance.</p></li>
<li><p>When the homecoming queen is a valedictorian and drum major.</p></li>
<li><p>When half the popular kids are in the top 10% and half are dumb as rocks, but everyone loves each other.</p></li>
<li><p>There are no freshmen (10-12).</p></li>
</ol>
<p>--when there are TV marathon weeks (one room for Friends, one room for Spongebob, and so on)
--when students aren't ranked
--when school officially ends a week before the end of May
--when there are movie nights with free food and free admission
--when liturgies shorten class time</p>
<p>-You have 2 majors IB and hospitality/tourism
-it' s easy to get a hiigh rank
- it's ghetto and there's no competition
- when you have a cell phone or an ipod people think u're rich
- hosting foriegn exchange trips to JAPAN
- majority of your classmates in japanese class wins competitions involving japanese</p>
<p>"My classmates are the sons of senator John McCain and the granddaughter of Justice Sandra Day O'Connor and the daughter of Tiger Woods."</p>
<p>Sorry to bust your bubble, but Tiger doesn't have a daughter, and if he did, she would be much to young as he just turned 30.</p>
<p>-when your teachers have smoothie parties at their houses and would invite you over at 9 am to do physics and have a steinway grand and play guitar and have the neatest handwriting in the world and really showed you what it meant to learn something
-when you can all sit around talking about anything with anyone at the school because there are only 240 of you in 3 buildings and it's snowing outside
-when even as a day student you can sign up for free "student activities" trips and pretty much get free meals at great restaurants on the weekends with transportation chaperoned by the best teachers ever
-when you're in charge of planning student activities
-when you have class in the dining hall when it's snowing (again)
-when you get a day off because half the school has a stomach virus (and you don't)
-when you can go to prom for 4 years, for free, downtown
-when you can take over the newspaper. bwahahahahha
-when you come on campus after three months of summer it feels like you've never left
-when you can order pizza in the library (I haven't, but it's been done)
-when your parking space kicks buttt
-when you only have a maximum of THREE Classes a day, sometimes even one or two
-when they give you money to spend for meals at each athletic away game, sometimes even $10 (hey! its NICE!)
-when they order boberry biscuits and sweet tea for the entire school during long break, or port city java
-when there's a chocolate fountain at prom
-when at graduation the headmaster has a little paragraph prepared about every graduate and what they have brought to the school
-when a week before senior exams all the advisors get to "roast" their seniors at the senior roast in chapel and everyone moves up from their form's assigned seating to the next place and the seniors go outside and start screeching because they're done with class and only have 4 exams left before freedom
-when girls wear white dresses to graduation and guys wear suits (no cap and gown for us)
-when graduation is on the lawn overlooking pisgah (well it used to be)</p>
<p>oh, now I feel prematurely homesick...</p>
<ul>
<li>when we get to sleep in until 10 am..:D</li>
</ul>
<p>-When the fire alarm goes off, you have to wait for an administrator to come on the intercom and tell you if you can go or if you have to stay.</p>
<p>-When they exclude you from class for a day or suspend you for coming to class late or skipping in order to INCREASE attendance.</p>
<p>-Give the kid drawing something, while being quiet, ISS or detention while some other kid who disrupts class and threatens people gets a "time out" and comes right back to class.</p>
<p>-When the guidance counselor says it's not her job to fill out you recommendation or print out your transcript.</p>
<p>-When the administrators know when someone goes off campus for Wendy's, yet don't know about fights that are going to happen, where drugs are sold, or that there is a car in the back parking lot where you can buy a gun illegally.</p>
<p>-When the NCLD Act declares your school as "Needs Improvement" and says you can transfer to another school no matter the population of the new school, but the district says you can't because your "meeting guidelines of THEIR curriculum" and says that they're not allowed to overcrowd other schools.</p>
<p>I have more. These are ALL true of my district. A bunch of bastards, they are!</p>
<p>-When the oldest teacher on the faculty is older than the school itself.
-When the youngest teacher looks like he/she's 15 years old
-When, for some weird reason, the tuition goes up at a rate higher than that of inflation (10% increase vs. 2-3% rate of inflation), yet the quality of education is exactly the same
-When companies like GM rent out the student center for parties
-When you find out that the person who designed the dorms also designs Marriott Hotels, yet I don't see the resemblance at all.
-When the "no hats" policy is only enforced by 1 faculty member
-When nobody enforces the "no cellphones during the academic day" policy
-When the procession of cars in the morning looks something like this: BMW, Mercedes, Gulfstream jet, Mercedes, Mercedes, SUV, Mercedes, BMW, BMW, Maybach, Helicopter, BMW, Rolls-Royce, Bentley, Jaguar, Limousine, Helicopter, Mercedes, SUV, BMW, SUV, Gulfstream jet, SUV, Mercedes, repeat ad infinitum</p>
<p>~When you get 50 min. off campus lunch freshman through senior year.
~When there are NO cliques to speak of.
~When you pull out food in the middle of class and the teacher asks if they can have some.
~When you have an entire community behind you and your school, giving money so the state budget cuts don't make us go under.
~When your teachers are more liberal than you are.
~When you have a university 3 blocks away where you can take classes and workshops, work with great faculty, get food, and hang out with college kids.</p>
<p>Yeah, I pretty much love my school.</p>