With marching band camps popping up everywhere, we know it can only mean one thing; the school year is about to start. For those of you that don't know me, I am a music education major at the University of Kansas, and I'm excited and honored to be serving as this year's Kansas NAfME Collegiate President. I hope everyone had a great summer. I spent my summer attending meetings with the KMEA board, helping high school marching bands and I was lucky enough to be able to attend the national NAfME advocacy conference held in Washington D.C. I was able to represent Kansas Collegiate NAfME and made sure our voice was heard with policy makers in D.C.

I would like to thank everyone who attended or sent in board reports to the June Collegiate Board Meeting. We discussed and shared some great ideas for chapters for this upcoming year.

We also discussed ideas for KCOMTEPS, which brings me to my next point; KCOMTEPS! For those of you who have never heard of KCOMTEPS, it is a great two-day mini-conference aimed primarily at collegiate members and their chapter advisors. Not only is it a great chance to meet other collegiate students and build contacts, we will also have several great guest speakers. Speakers so far include Dr. Debra Hedden (KU), Martha Gabel (KMEA President-Elect), and Hannah Nunnenkamp-Engelman (Tri-M). Along with our amazing speakers, we will be repeating the favorite repair clinic and question-answer panels. KCOMTEPS will be held September 28-29 in Wichita. Registration is $10 for students and $20 for each faculty member, and everyone must be a registered member of NAfME. Faculty advisors watch your email for more information on registration.

Let's have a great start to the semester and I hope to see you all at KCOMTEPS. If you have any questions over KCOMTEPS, collegiate chapters, or KMEA, feel free to email me.