Suttons Bay High School Band Helps Celebrate Inland Seas' 16th Birthday

Leland 6th Graders after their morning Schoolship program.

Mr. Posner dockside, leads the band aboard Inland Seas

The Following article appeared in this week's Leelanau Enterprise:
by Eric Carlson Click here for the complete article & more photos.

The deck of the schooner Inland Seas this week provided the perfect venue for the combined Suttons Bay High School/St. Mary School concert band to practice playing music from the hit movie Pirates of the Caribbean that will be featured in a concert open to the public tonight at the Suttons Bay High School auditorium. Members of the Suttons Bay/St. Mary concert band perform on the schoolship Inland Seas while preparing for a concert tonight, May 20, in the Suttons Bay High School auditorium.

"Can anybody say ‘Aargh?’” band director Alan Posner asked his students as they seated themselves amid the deadeyes and doghouses aboard the 77-foot schooner. “This should really get us in the mood for Thursday night’s performance.”

The concert band’s brief gig aboard the schoolship on Tuesday afternoon was in celebration of the 16th anniversary of the launching of the Inland Seas. Inland Seas Education Association (ISEA) director Tom Kelly noted that on May 18, 1994, the ship hit the water for the first time after construction was completed at a boat yard in Palm Coast, Fla. He offered pieces of a nautically themed birthday cake to the students following their performance.

Moments before the high school musicians showed up Tuesday, a group of sixth graders from Leland Public School was returning from a morning of hands-on science education aboard the schoolship as it plied the waters of Suttons Bay. After the concert, a group of students from Kennedy Middle School in Manistee embarked on a similar experience.

Sixteen years ago this week, Inland Seas Education Association Director Tom Kelly oversaw the launching of the schoolship Inland Seas at a boat yard in Palm Coast, Fla. The anniversary of the May 18, 1994 launching was marked in Suttons Bay on Tuesday with a concert by local high school students on the deck of the ship.The schoolship Inland Seas was specifically designed to educate and foster Great Lakes stewardship, with learning stations throughout the ship able to accommodate 32 students at a time for day trips or 10 students on overnight trips. Professional staff and trained volunteers provide instruction designed to dovetail with grade-level curriculum.

Additional programs for members of the public are scheduled for this summer. Anyone seeking more information may phone 271-3077 or visit http://www.schoolship.org/ online.