Overview
Even more daunting than practicing, performing, and competing is the prospect of organizing a successful drill team. How information flows from instructor to cadets to families and beyond can be a critical difference-maker int he success of the drill team throughout the season.
In this article, we’ll recommend three FREE online services to check out! Keep in mind, you school/district/etc. may have specific policies regarding the use of services such as these so make sure to check with the appropriate parties before implementation!
Discord
Discord is a popular group-chatting application originally developed for video gamers to chat while playing online with and against one another but it has since grown into a robust communication platform featuring both text and voice communication capabilities.
With Discord, a drill team can have a unique area just for communication and permissions can be created which allow users to access only the communication “channels” relevant to them.
Team commanders can have a separate area to discuss their needs while creating an announcements channel can allow instructors to communicate information to the entire group. With the permissions set properly, the announcements channel can prevent users from responding in text form thus reducing the clutter and keeping all information centralized.
With the ability to create separate channels, the regulation team can talk about their needs without disturbing those cadets only part of the color guard team.
Making a channel for appropriate social discussion encourages cadets to build relationships beyond their time at practice making for a more cohesive team. We’ve even seen a team set up a special channel just for sharing their Wordle results with one another.
While there is a learning curve, we almost guarantee there is at least one cadet on your drill team who is familiar with the interface and can help set up a “server” just for the team. This is a great way to communicate responsibly in a supervised and organized fashion!
Band
Band is an app popular for groups who routinely need to share information and media and would like to do so in a single, supervised platform.
The app functions very much like most social media sites and allows users to post information quickly to one another in a multitude of forms. This is great for sharing important forms such as permission slips, schedules, etc. with team members but also for posting practice videos, pictures from trips, etc. in a place everyone can easily access from their own device!
Band also gives you the ability to communicate out to individuals or small groups and has a robust array of moderation features which makes it ideal as a secure, supervised hub for your drill team!
Notion
Imagine if the entire Microsoft or Google suite of programs mashed itself into a website editor and you have the database-driven platform, Notion.
Notion is a platform that lets you organize information effectively – in almost every configuration imaginable – and lets you share that information with anyone who has access to the internet. It’s perfect for building rosters, itineraries, checklists, etc. and because each page can be shared online, team members can constantly be referencing it for up-to-date information!
Notion’s pages function much like Wikipedia pages; they are able to be edited by anyone with the correct permissions and they are almost fully customizable.
CLICK HERE FOR AN EXAMPLE OF AN ACTUAL COMPETITION ITINERARY CREATED IN NOTION