Issue:

The Pride of the Dakotas is celebrating two major anniversaries and deserves some credit for their extensive and glorified history.

Stance: 

We believe that The Pride has excellent presence here on campus, and we hope that they can continue this for many years to come.

This week, The Collegian decided to devote several pages to our university’s very own band—The Pride of the Dakotas. 

This year marks 125 years of band on campus and the 50th season of the group being officially called The Pride. 

We dedicated four pages to the student organization for many reasons, but our number one reason is simple—they are awesome. 

The Pride of the Dakotas has an extremely rich history and has been around for almost as long as the university itself. The group has developed a deep respect from current, former and future students at South Dakota State. 

If that isn’t enough, the band brings everyone together and forms an almost unbreakable school spirit. And obviously, the football games wouldn’t be the same without the sounds of The Pride spurring on the players and the fans. It truly drives crowd enthusiasm. 

Not only is the group itself great, the individuals really make the band what it is. They spend an hour and 15 minutes, four days a week practicing. Students involved in the drumline and the color guard spend an extra hour each of those days practicing. The students also pay to do it. In return, they get one credit. 

These students sacrifice a good chunk of their time every single week. And for that, we thought we could spend some of our time devoting our pages to celebrate the great success that this band deserves. 

Not many student groups can say they’ve performed for the King and Queen of England. Well, The Pride can. Back in 1939, the group traveled to Winnipeg, Canada to perform for the British monarchs. Not only did they get to perform, they also won the competition, a whopping total of $50, which they donated to the university. If that still doesn’t do it, the group also stayed at an orphanage while they were in Canada and performed for the children at the orphanage. 

Now that’s quite a history. 

So, this edition is for this amazing, historic group. We wish you a happy 125 years of band and hopefully another 125 more.

The Collegian staff meets weekly and agrees on the issue of the editorial.

The editorial represents the opinion of The Collegian.