As the 2011-12 school year begins, so does Kappa Kappa Psi, a new music fraternity/ reg­is­tered stu­dent orga­ni­za­tion on campus.

The RSO existed on Ferris’ cam­pus for a cou­ple of decades, but dis­ap­peared in the early 1990s due to the music pro­gram and the entire uni­ver­sity tak­ing a major finan­cial hit. Progress toward get­ting the group for­mu­lated again was brought about by Ferris students.

“We had some stu­dents who approached a cou­ple of us band direc­tors, myself and Dale Skornia (our pep band direc­tor), to get the group started up again,” said Dr. Richard Scott Cohen, asso­ciate pro­fes­sor and direc­tor of instru­men­tal con­cert ensem­bles. “The two of us are now the spon­sors for the group.”

“Dedicated band stu­dents ‘banded’ together to form the fra­ter­nity. We wanted to do more for, and get more, from the music pro­gram at FSU. All of us had pre­vi­ously been very involved in music and wanted to con­tinue to share our love of music and help oth­ers dis­cover their love of music,” said Pam Kurylowicz, FSU psy­chol­ogy grad­u­ate and for­mer mem­ber of KKY.

The RSO por­tion of the group started in 2009-10; the group is now near­ing com­ple­tion of becom­ing a fra­ter­nity on FSU’s campus.

“Before we could become the KKY fra­ter­nity we had to go through a trial period where we were known as a colony of KKY, which was just the time period when we learned what we needed to do as a group to be con­sid­ered a true fra­ter­nity,” said Drew Heath, one of the orig­i­nal orga­niz­ers of KKY and the first president.

Kappa Kappa Psi mem­bers, for the first time ever, worked this sum­mer on call­ing stu­dents who had band expe­ri­ence back in high school or at other col­leges that they’re trans­fer­ring from and try­ing to inform them about the band pro­gram to get them signed up.

“Wherever there has been music there have been friends,” said Kyle Maneke, his­tory edu­ca­tion major and for­mer mem­ber of the group.

The group is hop­ing to com­plete the third and final cer­e­mo­nial degrees early this fall and become a full-fledged chap­ter. They have com­pleted the require­ments for being an RSO and will be actively recruit­ing new mem­bers to be part of this new band fraternity.

“In high school I par­tic­i­pated in con­cert band, jazz band, and march­ing band, and really formed a fam­ily with all of the other musi­cians I grew up with,” said Krista Testolin, for­mer mem­ber of KKY when it first was first start­ing up in 2009-10. “Being able to join band at FSU was very com­fort­ing for me, and I was excited to be a part of such a won­der­ful group. KKY pro­vided means to get even closer to very tal­ented peo­ple who share the same appre­ci­a­tion for music as I do.”

To become a mem­ber, a stu­dent must be able to play an instru­ment and be part of one of the uni­ver­sity bands. There are sev­eral to choose from, includ­ing the ath­letic pep band, sym­phony band—which is the con­cert band in which most stu­dents begin—another con­cert band referred to as the con­cert band that is a 50–50 split between Ferris stu­dents and com­mu­nity mem­bers, and the jazz band.

“We have a phi­los­o­phy which we call Music for Life, where we try to find all the stu­dents who started play­ing before they get here and get them play­ing and involved on cam­pus and become part of the cam­pus cul­tural life,” said Dr. Cohen. “Then, along the way, we try to brain­wash them that this is some­thing they should con­tinue to do even after col­lege for fun. We’re try­ing to keep that musi­cal pas­sion alive and flourishing.”

“Music is an impor­tant part of my life because it gives me an escape from the nor­mal wears and tears of col­lege life. It also has allowed me to befriend peo­ple that are in dif­fer­ent pro­grams than I am and has diver­si­fied my col­lege expe­ri­ence,” said Logan May, pro­fes­sional golf man­age­ment major and one of the found­ing mem­bers of the group.

Heath has passed on the title of pres­i­dent this year to Eric Watson, a Ferris stu­dent major­ing in phar­macy and last year’s trea­surer of KKY.

“KKY was ini­ti­ated in order to pro­mote and increase the size and qual­ity of the music pro­gram,” said Watson.

“Music serves as a way to for­get about those every­day stresses that plague all us col­lege stu­dents. More impor­tantly, music has pro­vided the oppor­tu­nity to form bonds with oth­ers so strong it’s as if they were my own fam­ily,” said Jason Dunk, mem­ber of Kappa Kappa Psi and senior in foren­sic biol­ogy and biotechnology.

Dr. Cohen believes that it is impor­tant for stu­dents to get involved with music imme­di­ately when they arrive on campus.

“For the stu­dents com­ing here with that expe­ri­ence, music is a big part of who they’ve been and who they are ever since typ­i­cally mid­dle school,” said Dr. Cohen. “So just because they’re not going to be study­ing music for a pro­fes­sion is no rea­son to give that up. I think it helps them to con­tinue to be who they are and do what they enjoy doing in a new setting.”

Taking part in music at Ferris also helps stu­dents to meet oth­ers with sim­i­lar inter­ests from all over the country.

“They also help cre­ate a really nice atmos­phere, which spreads beyond cam­pus into the greater Big Rapids area and helps cre­ate a really good bond between the uni­ver­sity and the rest of Big Rapids,” said Dr. Cohen. “Our musi­cal groups serve as a really good cul­tural bridge between the uni­ver­sity and the local com­mu­nity, and these stu­dents com­ing in can play a really big role in that.”

“Music is my cre­ative out­let. It’s more a part of who I am than my name! I think it would be hard to find some­one who doesn’t like music of some type; it’s a uni­ver­sal lan­guage that spreads across cul­ture and con­ti­nent,” said Kurylowicz.

For more infor­ma­tion about KKY or get­ting involved with music at Ferris, con­tact Dr. Cohen at cohenr@ferris.edu.