By PAT NEWMAN
Staff Writer

Fayette County High School Band's dream trip to the 2000 Olympics in Australia is off, according to Jeff Anderson, co-chairman of the schools' trip committee. The band organizers received word last night that the Sydney Olympic Committee had rescinded invitations to what they referred to as “foreign nationals” to participate in opening ceremonies.

Too many foreigners and not enough Australians, was their reason, Anderson said. “We're 99.9 percent sure we're not going,” he added. “We've started phoning parents about the trip, and are looking into how we can get compensated for money we've already spent,” Anderson said.

Bill Lutz, who heads up World Projects, the group organizing the trip for Fayette County High and Walton High in Cobb County, is in Australia now, Anderson said, trying to hammer out details.

Approximately 220 Fayette County High School musicians had been tooting their horns and trying to drum up some money, to the tune of $3,600 apiece, for their 2000 trip to the Summer Olympics in Sydney, Australia.

Fayette County and Walton High School in Cobb County had joined forces and set a goal of raising $1 million for the trip.

Fayette County High's band director Kenneth Beard said the $3,600 may have been a little inflated, but a lot depended on how much the two band booster clubs could have accrued to help finance the trip. He said they had been seeking corporate sponsorship and some major corporate donations to defray travel costs.

While the FCHS band trip is off, other school groups are gearing up for major trips. Next spring, 43 members of the school's select chorus will perform in schools and cathedrals in England. According to the field trip request filed with the Board of Education by teacher Janice Folsom, the students will tour London, Windsor, Oxford, Stratford, Canterbury, Dover, Paris, Versailles and Chartres.

After Christmas 2000, 100 members of Sandy Creek High School's marching band will travel to London to participate in that city's New Year's Day Parade. The band will be one of 16 high school and college marching bands from the United States invited to participate. They participated in the same event in January 1996 and Mark Elrod, Sandy Creek's band director, participated in the parade with the Central Carroll High School band in 1998.

“From my experience, I can tell you it was by far the most educational, well planned and organized band trip of which I have ever been a part,” Elrod said. Estimated costs of the trip is $1,625 per person.