While Ferndale High’s football team has been a dominant force for several years in state class 3A play, the marching band that performs during halftime has been proving itself among the best in the state, too. Now it’s time for us to toot their horn.

Last Sunday, the band placed first for the third year in a row at the state’s top marching band competition in Auburn. More than 30 bands competed in four divisions depending on band size. Under the direction of Ferndale High band teacher Steve Menefee, the 65- member band, its drum majors and color guard flag performers were cited for excellence in musical performance, marching precision and formation drills. The band was tops in categories for drum majors, percussion, marching and general effect.

When a high school football team takes the field, everyone knows the commitment its players have made, from grueling practices in full gear during the heat of summer to seemingly endless drills after school in the autumn rain. High school football has been the subject of several movies and TV shows.

But how many people truly appreciate the band out there at halftime? It takes just as much practice to memorize the music, the steps, the moves and formations that you see the band perform. Menefee says he estimates that students practice 10 hours for every 1 minute of their performance.

At Ferndale High, as at most schools, marching band is an extra-curricular activity, just like sports. Practices start in the summer with a one-week band camp and retreat where the members learn the show they will perform for the season. Every Monday, the students practice for 2½ hours after school. During the football season, they perform four halftime shows and compete at three weekend events, such as last week’s competition in Auburn, an annual Veterans Day event that marching bands statewide see as their Super Bowl.

Band parent Kathy Green, secretary of the Band Boosters, says this year’s honor was all the more gratifying because it had been seen as a rebuilding season with fewer students after a large graduating class last year. Menefee says he is proud of his students for returning Ferndale’s marching band to the level of excellence achieved in the 1980s and early 1990s.

But such quality programs aren’t cheap. Menefee says the Band Boosters organization raises at least half of the $12,000 annual budget, while the school district kicks in the rest.

Boosters are just now starting to promote their annual dinner and auction, set for Feb. 9 at Fox Hall in Bellingham. Tickets are $40 per person and include dinner, silent and live auctions, a dessert auction and musical entertainment. Last year’s event raised money for an equipment trailer and new raincoats for the students. This year, the group hopes to buy a computer-assisted music-composition lab. Other needs include instrument purchase and repair, travel expenses, equipment maintenance, and scholarship money for student band fees and leadership camps.

Several other accomplishments last week deserve note:

IN THE BAG

If you want your groceries packed efficiently, head over to the Cost Cutter supermarket on Sunset Drive and get in the line where Harvey Unruh is working. Unruh, 66, won the Washington Food Industry’s 2007 Washington State Best Bagger Contest last month. Unruh has been a Cost Cutter bagger since 1999. Now he’s getting ready for the national competition against the best baggers across the country in Las Vegas in February.

WHEEL EFFICIENCY

Western Washington University assistant professor Jason Morris has made life a little easier for Ugandan pedicab drivers, who were hauling people around on the fenders of rickety 1970s-era bicycles.

Morris, whose mother is an Anglican minister doing mission work in the African country, got input from drivers and came up with a design like a pickup truck with a long platform for passengers or hauling gear.

He spent the spring and summer working on a prototype, with some financial assistance from WWU. He got help from Meridian High School senior Mark Hardin for a three-week trip to Uganda to test the prototype.

NEW INTERPRETATION

When Western Washington University staff talk with prospective students and parents, they sometimes run into a language barrier. So WWU’s Modern and Classical Languages Department helped create a recruiting pamphlet for parents whose first language is Spanish. It’s a wise and compassionate move. As more and more Spanish speakers enter this county, such extra efforts at acceptance will be required.