The Great Bend High School choir students are spending spring break in Washington, D.C. Vocal Music Director Susan Stambaugh said they had a send-off for their six-day trip on Wednesday and will be back on Monday.

The sendoff was led by student Vianney Rodriguez. “The sendoff also included a short concert followed with notes and roses to thank parents as they said their good-byes,” Stambaugh said.

Stambaugh has taken trips with the A Cappella Choir and the Madrigals for over 30 years. Sixty-one people are taking the trip. Students raise funds for the trip individually. Parents are allowed to travel with the choir as sponsors but they must pay the same amount as the students.

Students were scheduled to sing in the Basilica of the Shrine of Immaculate Conception, at the Lincoln Memorial and at the Bethesda Presbyterian Church, where a historian will talk about the historical significance of the building.

During their trip, students also planned to tour the Smithsonian’s museums, the Capitol, the National Cathedral, the Holocaust Museum and Mount Vernon. They would also experience guided tours of Arlington Museum and evening guided tours of the monuments, as well as a riverboat cruise with a formal dinner and dance.

“Ironically, Dr. Z. Randall Stroope, who came as a clinician for our first Spiritu Chorale Collective to Great Bend in the fall, will be there leading a Mass choir in the National Cathedral at the same time that we’re singing in the Shrine of the Immaculate Conception,” Stambaugh said. “Our plans were already made, or we would have joined him there.”

The trip is optional for choir members. Although the entire choir will not be there, “strong representation of the choir is involved,” Stambaugh said. “GBHS and Great Bend will be well represented.” Maggie McCain is traveling with the choir as the accompanist.

Students will return to school on Tuesday to join a combined district rehearsal first thing in the morning to prepare for the Grades 6-12 concert that also includes the 105-member USD 428 Youth Choir, consisting of students in grades 4-8. That concert will be at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, March 24.

“That concert is just part of our district’s celebration of the national Music in Our Schools Month: Elevation Across America, and that concert will carry forth the theme of our trip, which is Panther Proud, Sing it Loud," Stambaugh said. “Then on Sunday, March 29, the Youth Choir and the high school choirs will be performing in a combined concert in the GBHS Auditorium.”