Edited Band Story

It’s Sept. 3, the first home football game of the season for the University of Mississippi. Everyone is excited, in good spirits, and having a great time. It appears everything is going as it should, except in one corner of the student section of the football stadium.

According to an Ole Miss marching band teaching assistant of the Ole Miss marching band, this was the first time the band was moved to the student section of the football stadium. The students had complained that the band could not be heard from its prior position in the stadium, which is why the band was moved.

Although this simple move should not have been a big problem, it became quite a mess. Jim Stites, a teaching assistant, said it was the band’s first time in a new place, everything did not go as smooth as everyone wanted.

The drum major of the Pride of the South, Chris Presley, said the band director hired the University Police Department to act as the band’s security, but the UPD never came as they were supposed to.

“The drum major and the TAs [teaching assistants] had to act as the band’s security and keep other people from coming into the band’s section of the stands,” Presley said.

Presley said for the next game, the band directors will call and confirm with the UPD to ensure the band’s security shows up for the next game.

A fourth year member of the Ole Miss marching band, Kelli Harrison, said she did not understand the students’ rude behavior toward the band. Band members’ possessions were stolen when the band left the stands to perform its half-time show she added.

“If the security had shown up like they were supposed to, none of this would have happened,” she said.

Harrison said she cannot understand why students would act rudely towards fellow students. She said even if those students happen to be in the band, they are still just students like everyone else.

“I’m so ashamed of Ole Miss students,” Harrison said. “And I wish I wasn’t a student at Ole Miss right now.”