Every day this week, music has drifted through the halls of KHS as part of the Tri-M Music Honor Society’s March Madness Event. Students can vote for their favorite music genres whether it’s hip-hop, musicals, Latin, pop, rock, and many more through their emails.

Spanish teacher and World Language Chairperson Hannah Sappio says, “Mrs. Hendricks, Kiera Fischbeck, and Nathan Shurts reached out to me and asked if I could help them with this fun event that they wanted to do for the entire school… So as a group for the Tri-M, they chose 16 songs to put in the bracket and then they sent me all the forms to distribute to the whole school… and then each grade created their brackets, then once a day we break the brackets down more and more.”

Among many fundraisers and drives, this is the honor society’s newest event to connect the school community with music. Tri-M honor society member and junior Sadie Smith describes some of the society programs. “We did a clothing drive in February… we got five bags of clothes, 40 pounds I think. They also do monthly playlists, where they send out a playlist for the month. So I’d say reception is pretty good.”

Through this engaging and fun event, Tri-M has brought an innovative idea and caught the attention of the school through the loudspeaker announcements and email blasts. Junior Alexander Ives has been voting and taking part in the event. He says, “I’m just curious to see what everyone thinks is the best. I like being part of that because [for] this school itself, I want to see the ideas the school has for what music genre is best.”

Sappio even notes she sees that “People are enjoying it. They’re enjoying that little bit of music that they get to hear every single day, it’s a little fun thing… you get some teachers that are dancing, get some kids that are like, ‘Oh, I wish it was this song, why did they choose this song instead of that song for the genre.’ But it’s just something fun to lighten the load.”

Unlike many honor societies, the March Madness event isn’t strictly academic-based and helps to take away from the stress of school and studying. Ives says, “When it comes down to honor societies and groups, I think it’s nice when they have stuff that isn’t entirely academic-focused. Like this voting and the music, it’s something to take your mind off all the studying you have to do.”