I thought the Corps looked great on TV. From the noise they were making it also sounds like they made their presence known. Good job by the Commandant making this happen for the second year in a row.
Dallas should be the next Corps Trip. I trust "whoever" is in charge of Corps Trips gets working on making it happen next year.
We could start the "Seat Donation" request earlier and perhaps with better results. Has the 12th Man Foundation been asked to help? Seems they would have an interest in helping.
Out
The Main Thing is to keep The Main Thing The Main Thing
Seeing so many posts from cadets that were in car accidents, or had to pay $40 - $50 to park, or the numerous kids who had their car towed at the game, points to some other issues that DFW Ags and mom groups might be able to help with.
Some cadets rented hotel rooms - I can't confirm or deny the necessity, but hope that no one paid for a hotel because they felt they had nowhere else to stay. We could have taken more in for the weekend, and I am sure there are other families that would be happy to host, even if they don't have a current tie to the Corps.
Surely there is a Aggie owned company or a local high school where the cadets could park and be shuttled to the stadium.
The Corps looked and sounded great marching through Fort Worth Saturday morning, they looked sharp on television at the game. I appreciate everyone who donated toward the tickets, and I know that there have to be more families like mine that would be happy to help make sure that the Corps trips keep happening, especially if we can find ways to insure that they are less of a burden on the cadets.
EDIT to add P.S. - Hope they clear up the issue of whether or not Zips can wear their spurs to the stadium. Security made many remove and carry them, saying they scratched the floor, would not listen to logic that the spurs don't even touch the floor. Likely the taps, if anything was, in fact, scratching Jerry's floor.
There were 2 accidents involving cadets driving to the game. TWO. No injuries, thankfully, and minor damage to vehicles, but only TWO accidents out of over 2400 cadets that went to the game.
What "numerous kids" got their cars towed? Do you have numbers or better yet, names? I got NO reports of "Numerous" cars being towed. Exactly what is your source of this information?? IF that is true, WHY did they get towed?? Does your "source" have that information too??
Its not difficult to park around AT&T Stadium. In addition, there were lots near Rangers Stadium that cost very little, if anything, to park in. If you wanted to park right next to the stadium, then yes, $40-$50 is what it generally costs. But those a little further away don't cost NEAR that much. MANY people - including me - use those lots and walk to the stadium. Its NOT that far, and is very inexpensive compared to the costs you will pay for a lot right near the stadium.
Every unit had to account for all their cadets last week and where they were staying. NONE reported anyone was staying in a hotel. All reported that all cadets had homes to stay at. IF a cadet rented a hotel, I'd be interested in knowing why, as we had plenty of offers from former students to have a cadet stay at their home if they weren't already staying with another cadet's family (which virtually all did). Again, do you have numbers or names of those who supposedly stayed in hotels??
I walked around and talked to cadets at the game, including seniors. I didn't see ONE senior cadet that wasn't wearing his/her spurs (that is something thats EASY to notice). They may have had to take them off to pass thru the metal detectors outside the stadium, (all of us had to go through them and remove hats and empty pockets), but all the seniors I saw inside the stadium were wearing their spurs - including those in the Band and the ODs. I never heard a single senior say anything about being told they couldn't wear spurs because they would "scratch the floor." Your source for this information?
The Corps Trip is a tradition that goes back for many decades, and they have generated some of the best memories that many former cadets still cherish. This past weekend was no different. The whole Corps marched-in to Ft Worth (like we used to do every year for decades), then the entire Corps attended the football game - something they were able to do because of the generosity of former students, family members, and friends of the Corps. How that is a "burden" escapes me, but I can assure you that the cadets had a great time, they watched a great game, made a huge difference by being there, and no doubt have made many great memories from this weekend's experience. Again, I have no idea where you got your information, but it contradicts completely what I saw and heard directly from the cadets last weekend at the march-in and at the game.
We will have a Corps Trip again next year, and hope to march-in to Dallas next year, assuming the City of Dallas allows us to (which they didn't this year). We look forward to next year's march-in and having the entire Corps attend the game again, and I know the cadets look forward to it as well.
Former cadet here. I hated corps trips with a passion. Not everyone loves football enough to want to spend a weekend (and a ton of money) driving across Texas to watch football.
Dead BQ Here. I really enjoyed the Corps Trip, especially my fish year, because I got to spend time with my buddies outside of just the dorms. I know it was harder on CTs, but that's something that's been getting a lot easier, with their tickets being paid for.
Fact is, Corps members are the Keepers of Tradition and all that. A lot of those traditions revolve around football games. If you can't deal with your weekends, your time, and yes, some of your money being taken up by that, I would respectfully suggest not joining an organization whose mission it is to maintain A&M's traditions and culture. I had plenty of buddies who just tolerated the games during our four years and barely watched them during their victory lap, and I didn't think any (well, ok, much) less of them. I get that football is actually not for everyone, but IMO, the traditions are about bringing people together, and Corps Trips were a fun way to do that.
That said, I don't like that they're busing the band up there now, part of the fun was getting to experience the homes of your Dallas buds.
First - I'm glad the Commandant is on here to refute the rumor mill.
These days with everybody and their brother being on the Internet from every imaginable device, it's amazing how quickly things get out of hand. And of course everything everybody reads 3rd hand on the Internet must be true.
Second - I'm so glad the Corps still does what I'll call unsupported Corps Trips (by that I mean no busses). Frankly, this is the kind of thing that takes young men and women and prepares them for the leadership roles they will assume when they get out there in the real world.
Third - For the crowd who doesn't like football, guess what?, I don't really like American Football (Gridiron) either (probably because I didn't grow up in Texas) but, I've been to a solid 100 Texas A&M Games ever since I first saw Tony Franklin kick the ball out of the Baylor end zone in Waco in 1977.
Over my years of going to Texas A&M games, I've had some really great experiences - Holiday Bowl 1990 and some really terrible experiences - the entire Franchione era but most specifically sitting next to John Elway in Boulder watching the most embarrassing performance I've ever seen by an A&M squad in 2005.
But for this thread I want to touch on the value of the Corps Trips.
When I went on my first Corps Trip to Houston in Fall 1988, I was 18 years old and had only been living in the United States/Texas for 3 years. There were no cell phones or satellite navigation and frankly, I had no idea how they possibly expected people to all show up at a specific time on Saturday morning in downtown Houston but, it all worked. I stayed with family in Galveston and most of my buddies stayed with other buddies (5-10 per house) in Spring and Kingwood. As with any out of town trip, there was always somebody who was missing a uniform part or somebody who forgot their band instrument (even a Bugle Rank member from time to time) but, by and large, it went off flawlessly. Yeah, we probably had to pay to park but it couldn't have been too much since I was broke, I would have remembered that.
My second Corps Trip was to Austin where I stayed with a H.S. buddy on the t.u. campus in the Jester dormitory. Thinking back now, how hilarious was it for me to be falling out of Jester in my Winter "AA"s with my white belt to meet up with my BQ buddies to march down Congress Ave.? In fact, the guys I felt sorry for were the CTs who got to/had to leave after March-In and didn't get to attend the game in Austin. At least with the game in Fort Worth against Arkansas, they all got to attend.
As a sophomore, we had Corps Trips to Houston and Fort Worth. By now, I was 19 and had really only been to the DFW Metroplex maybe 4-5 times ever. Some of the things I learned were:
Plano is nowhere near Fort Worth
"Loop" 820 is not like Loop 610
One Dozen donuts is not going to feed 10 BQs for breakfast
Your buddy in the backseat sucking face with his girlfriend doesn't really care if you ever make it back to his house in Plano as long as you don't interrupt his makeout session.
I know that sounds like real basic stuff but, trust me, besides these, there were many life lessons that would be driven home by going on Corps Trips.
I included this section just for posterity because I thought about it while I was reminiscing about the other Corps Trips early in my A&M Career.
Houston (Rice) we had down because we'd done it before but somehow the fish (including the now regionally famous singer/songwriter) all made it too. We did have one epic malfunction with those fish on a trip but, that wasn't until my Zip year and it was on a bus trip to LSU. One of the Juniors got his hands on some alcohol and missed the bus. What was really embarrassing when his teetotaller parents, who had driven from their home in Beaumont met the FTAB for lunch in Lake Charles, wanted to know why their son hadn't made the trip. Uh, because he was passed out back in the dorm.
For those of us from small towns, Corps Trips help you learn how to navigate in the big city. For everybody, you learn how to work with people and how to show up to work without assistance. Frankly, that's probably even more important in this era of helicopter parents. And because you're often staying with your families that are different than your own, you learn a lot there too (see spending splurge on 1 dozen donuts comment).
To give some quick examples of how this kind of experience maps out in real life, I'm responsible for technical training of a global business unit. As a result, my team often has to travel to far away lands and work with all sorts of people. What's funny is how many of my co-workers won't leave their hotel room in places like Bangalore or insist on being met at the airport by a driver from the hotel in places like Shanghai. They won't even try to use the public transport or figure out how to get someplace on their own. I wouldn't attribute it solely to my experience with Corps trips but the bottom line is that Corps Trips help you get out of your comfort zone and experience things that you might not be familiar with. Corps Trips definitely help with keeping people from being such prima donnas that they can't do things for themselves (that is rampant in my line of work).
Lastly for the folks who don't care for Corps Trips, I'll describe a philosophy that I learned from a guy I used to listen to on the radio in Los Angeles. Jim Ladd used to host a freeform radio show on 95.5 KLOS where he would just play whatever he felt like playing (in fact, the Tom Petty song - the Last DJ was written about Jim Ladd). When he did that, he described it as taking the listener on a journey. Sometimes he would play a lot of good songs that I liked and then he would play a song that wasn't bad per se but it wasn't something I would have selected or a song I would never have found on my own. He described that as akin to making a wrong turn and going down a path that you didn't intend to go down. Every once in a while when you get dragged down one of those accidental paths, if you're paying attention, you might stumble onto something you really like. So, that discovery makes the "mistake" on your journey worth it even though things didn't go as you had planned perfectly in your mind ahead of time.
So, I say - take the Corps Trips and keep your eyes open. You never know what you might discover or how that might benefit you later. I'll spare you my rant about how on a Corps Trip my Junior Year, I learned that Sherman is essentially in Oklahoma and is NOT just a suburb of Dallas as my buddy (who is now a professional political rabblerouser) led us to believe. Needless to say, I always do a good map recon before I make a move these days. Especially when I get directions from a friend or a personal guarantee about the travel times
I am sorry that my post wanting to help address the issues that we parents of cadets/host families were made aware of, was taken in a negative manner. The very first sentence ends with my desire to improve the experience for future trips. Would you consider re-reading my post through that lens?
I apologize for the syntax, I was commenting on the total number of posts and emails about the issues, I didn't mean to insinuate that there were dozens of car accidents. And I realize that, in the big picture of 2400 cadets, the six or seven cars that I personally know of that were towed is a small percentage - though it is $300 that those cadets could likely have put to better use.
I don't want to be the one who gets someone in trouble for choosing to stay at a hotel, I was offering to be the one who opens my door if any of those cadets felt they didn't have another option.
Can we just be honest about Corps communication? It isn't always great. I am sure that some outfits do a much better job than others. The cadets I hosted had been told where to be, and when, they hadn't been given any guidance on parking options or how much time to allow to find a lot and walk. How is it wrong to suggest that a safe, low-cost or free shuttle option would be fantastic for cadets that have already paid for gas, parking for the March-In, and their share of the game ticket? Heck, if there were a local Ag shuttle for the game, I would be interested in taking it.
The entry that my Zip's group used told all cadets coming through that spurs must be removed and could not be worn because they scratch the floors (an order that they promptly ignored once out of sight of the gate security personnel).
As you can see, I am my own source. I have opened my checkbook and my home to the Corps, but thought that maybe there were other ways that I could support the cadets, especially when they travel to my hometown. It was never my intent to cast the Corps, or this trip, in a negative light, I simply wanted to improve the experience for future trips.
I get the 'Keepers of the Spirit' point of view, but here is another reason I think the Corps Trip is great. With all of the commitments that come with being a college student, the Corps Trip is an extremely rare occasion in which an entire class (especially fish year) comes together and bonds. They carpool to DFW, sleep on floors and couches, devour all of the food in sight, and make memories they will never forget. During my junior year, I lost a fish buddy. Looking back on the 2 and a half years we got with him, I'm so thankful for the time we got to spend as a class during the Corps Trip.
We packed cars full, split the cost of gas, and stayed with fish buddies that lived in the area. My biggest expenses were stopping in West for Kolaches and buying Nachos at Jerryworld.
Fall 1982 - Corps trips to Dallas for Aggies vs SMU (pre Death Penalty days for the ponies). My memory of that weekend is staying at a fish buddy's house in Plano (he knows who he is), and us fish being late for marchin the next morning.
As if it wasn't bad enough that one of us (he knows who he is too) forgot a black tie and had to use (i.e. VisMod) a black sock, our Guidon Bearer gave us the Guidon to bring to the marchin. Imagine his face when the outfit had to step off and march a few blocks without a guidon. Priceless...
Needless to say, the Class of '86 got real good at pushups and steam shower crapouts for a few weeks after that.
That is what Corps Trips are all about. And retelling that story to my son's buddies at the kitchen table last Saturday night over a few beers.....
quote: Can we just be honest about Corps communication? It isn't always great. I am sure that some outfits do a much better job than others.
The Commandant has bragged on this forum about how cadets are the WORST source of information about the Corps, and know nothing about what is going on. Pretty odd for a a "cadet run organization", but far be it from me to judge
quote: Can we just be honest about Corps communication? It isn't always great. I am sure that some outfits do a much better job than others.
The Commandant has bragged on this forum about how cadets are the WORST source of information about the Corps, and know nothing about what is going on. Pretty odd for a a "cadet run organization", but far be it from me to judge
How is that any different than the military? Or any other large multilayer orginization? The lower the layer, the least informed. Or vice versa depending on which end you are looking from.
I remember crashing at fish buddies houses ( SMU '82) and one time we had 12 fish in one hotel room (Austin 82). Crashed the band party at their hotel and drank their booze(Lubbock '85). As seniors we had a pony keg in the trunk of the car with the spigot hose run up through the back seat. Had to stop every 30 to 45 minutes or so to pump up the keg.
I also rememer MASSIVE class pullouts. I think that was also a requirement for a Corps trip. The more redass the better. And subsequently paying the piper for such redassness. Nothing is free.
Nothing was taken in a "negative manner." I just wanted to provide the facts as I knew them - NOT generalities based on second and third hand information. Those kinds of comments DO cast the Corps Trip in a negative light - especially among uninformed parents and others who have never lived the Corps Trip experience. As the person responsible for the health and welfare of ~2500 cadets, I just want to ensure that the right info gets out when cadets are involved in something like this. That's it. Just the facts - NOT misinformation, which often permeates this particular forum, especially when it involves the Corps.
NO ONE is getting in trouble over anything that's been posted here. I can assure you of that. IF a cadet chose to stay in a hotel, that's their prerogative. But every cadet was offered a place to stay with either cadet families or former students. There was no "burden" wrt where a cadet could stay in the DFW area. All had a place, but if a cadet or cadets chose to stay in a hotel, that was their call, and no one will get in trouble for it.
IF we had as many cadets get their cars towed as you say there were, I would first question WHY? My guess is that IF that's true, that we had cadets parking in places where they weren't supposed to. Its not difficult to find parking around AT&T Stadium, and lots are well marked - even the "ad hoc" lots set up by folks who live around the stadium. If a cadet's car got towed, my guess is that he/she parked someplace where they shouldn't have been, and thus got towed. The Corps Commander had no knowledge of ANY cadets being towed when I talked to her this afternoon, BTW.
Cadets DID get told to remove spurs at the metal detector, but ALL put them back on once inside the stadium. Some got told that they would scratch the floor if they wore them, but ALL put their spurs back on once inside the stadium. The Corps Commander said she personally saw the seniors putting their spurs back on once inside the stadium.
Your Zip and his classmates didn't know where to park and how to walk to the stadium? Did they not attend last year? All the cadets made it to the stadium and to the game without us having to provide them a map and detailed timeline of when to get there, where to park, how long a walk would be based on what lot they parked in, where the gates were, etc. Most people attending games at AT&T Stadium figure that out pretty well on their own, and I firmly believe our adult cadets - especially seniors - are more than capable of doing so also.
To clarify "A Person's" post, I never "bragged" that cadets didn't know what was going on. What I said was that cadets were the worst source to ask about rumors/misinformation concerning the Corps. There are always rumors flying around the Quad, and cadets are the worst source of what the truth truly is - especially when a good stream of misinformation gets started on TexAgs! I fully expect cadets to be fully informed about Corps activities - including Corps Trips, which are clearly detailed in an OpOrder. But I will absolutely acknowledge that information does not always flow all the way to the lowest levels of the Corps. I can put out on Monday that we are going to have a Corps BBQ on Friday afternoon compliments of the Commandant, and Friday morning I will still have fish that know absolutely nothing about it. Exactly why I post the schedule for football weekends on my e-newsletter. Parents kept complaining to me that their cadets never told them anything about what was happening on football game days because in many cases they didn't know - even though the information had been posted and the OpOrder was out. They're young and still learning, but I have also seen the same thing in the Army, and even here at A&M. Its NOT unique to the Corps of Cadets.
Again, no intent to sound angry or defensive. My apologies if I did. I just wanted to set the record straight, and ask that before unsubstantiated info about the Corps and the cadets gets posted and potentially upsets parents and others who don't know better, that you check your sources to ensure that what you are putting out is indeed fact. Again, rumor control is NOT the best among cadets, and they are not necessarily the best source at confirming or denying rumors. I will always do my best to ensure that FACTS are put out and NOT rumor or misinformation.
Thanks to all for your love and support of our Corps. BTHO Mississippi State!
For those of you complaining about buses, etc. I'm glad you have so many fond memories of Corps Trips. But my strongest Corps Trip memory is trying to get in touch with everyone in the outfit to tell them that the report back time had been extended because a cadet died in a car crash coming back to campus. I believe this was 2000/2001.
We still has tons of fun on band trips exploring the cities using local transportation once we had been bused or flown to a city.
When it comes time to ask for donations for cadet tickets next year, it needs to be mentioned how much noise they made in OT the past two years, and probably helped affect the outcome of the game.
I remember the 2006 Corps Trip to San Antonio where we almost lost to West Point. The Alamodome got so loud during Army's last drive, it was deafening, and the team made a goal line stand for 4 downs. I also remember getting lost on the loop around San Antonio after midnight yell. What should've been a 2 mile drive to our motel (where we stuffed at least 12 of us in one room), turned into a road trip of its own in the opposite direction around the city.
quote:Definitely were heard and seen at JerryWorld. Made a difference!
I ask "How could you tell?" Pretty much the whole endzone was off the scale. I was standing with my son and his roommates. Our whole section was going nuts. Ears were ringing still ringing when I went to the car.
