KIPP Tulsa News
High note: The marching band program at KIPP Tulsa University Prep
Written by Sharon Bishop-Baldwin; published in Tulsa People
KIPP Tulsa University Prep might not have a football team, but they do have an exceptional marching band program.
For Jakari Reynolds, who graduated from KIPP in May, the school’s band program wasn’t just an extracurricular activity; it paved the way for him to march off to college this month.
Reynolds, a percussionist who began performing with the KIPP Tulsa marching band when he was a student at Thoreau Middle School, will attend Jackson State University in Jackson, Mississippi, this fall. He’ll major in business administration and will march with the band.
Although his participation in the KIPP band program was initially encouraged by his mom, Reynolds soon fell in love with it all on his own. “I was always into music, so it just kind of followed my passion, and I stuck with it,” he says.
On the surface, the band program at KIPP Tulsa University Prep looks like most others — instruments, music and hot summer marching practices. But there’s a bigger mission: exposing students to the possibilities of their futures.
College exposure is what band director Curtez Rasool mentions first when he lists what his program can do for students. Leaders take students to see graduates perform with the bands at colleges they attend.
“You can talk about it all the time, but if they don’t see it, then that’s a different feeling,” Rasool says.