We are proud of all our Valley kids

We’ve made no secret of our support for the Colony High School Marching Band. We cheered and wrote stories while they fundraised to earn the thousands of dollars needed to be part of a once in a lifetime trip to participate in the Rose Parade.

One of our employees’ son is part of the band and went with them on the California adventure last year. Our Facebook feed was all Knights all the time during that trip.

Only once in the history of Alaska and the 100-year history of the Rose Parade has an Alaska Marching Band been tapped to take part. So of course we threw our full weight behind these kids for about a year while they did every kind of fundraiser you can name to pay their way to The Golden State.

We cover high school sports and we cover school news from elementary school through Mat-Su College here. Still it seems like we give more ink to athletics than academics and activities. So here’s a bit of ink in praise of academics and activities.

Perhaps you already saw the story online about what happened during the Knights performance at the last football game of the year. If not, sit back while we borrow from Director Jamin Burton’s Facebook post from Saturday night to share this story.

After a problem getting a trailer to pull to Fairbanks, a seven-hour bus ride, setting up in lightly falling snow, and freezing through the whole first half of the game, the band finally took the field.

“About a minute or two into our six-minute performance the power went out and the cloudy snowy night went pitch black,” Burton wrote Saturday at 7:59 p.m.

As music teachers go, Burton is a legend for being tough. Every musician in the band must be able to perform the music and marches from memory, which came in handy Saturday.

When they finished their first of two songs, Burton said the drum major looked over at him for direction and he nodded to keep going. So the band played on, in the dark.

From the mumblings in the stands, and later from videos North Pole fans posted, it’s pretty clear our kids turned heads in the Fairbanks North Star Borough.

“The home stands (for the rival team) got out their flashlights and lit the field as well as they could while we played our second show,” Burton wrote.

“So proud of my students who were prepared to meet adversity and turn a potential disaster into a triumph. Thank you to the North Pole community for your lights and very vocal support of the performance.”

Thank you Knights for making us proud to say you are our Valley kids! And thank you Mr. Burton for reminding us to always be “prepared to meet adversity and turn a potential disaster into a triumph.”