Please contact us if you are interested in naming any of the areas below with your Family name, your Company Name, or your Corporate Name.
General donations will get your name, family name, company name prominently displayed on this wall in the Performing Arts Commons.
We will need to outfit our new Marching Band with Rock Ridge Wolverine Band Uniforms. We would appreciate and recognize your support for this project. We want to come marching down the street with class, style, and perfection.
Just like the Band, Rock Ridge will need to purchase new choir robes for our top choirs. Your support will be greatly appreciated and recognized for this project. We plan to take over any stage that we are on by looking and sounding like a professional choir.
With a donation, or collective donation of $10,000 to our #RockRidgeRising campaign, we will forever recognize your special performing arts conductor or teacher. The teacher recognition will feature a plaque outside of the classroom and commemorate the history of the great teacher, a picture (optional), and will remain in that spot forever.
Please help us honor Mr. Frandsen with a donation to support the naming of a Music Learning Lab as Dallis Frandsen Music Lab. Mr. Frandsen had incredible success and influence on Virginia High School students. Mr. Frandsen taught all levels of Choir at Virginia High School from 1967 until winter of 1996. He had a retirement reception following his holiday concert in December of 1996. He built the program up from music classes to top notch, award winning choirs. His A Cappella choirs were recognized as the best in the state of Minnesota throughout the years. Mr. Frandsen also took high school musicals to the next level. Each year, he would provide opportunities for 100’s of high school students to be a part of a professional musical that everyone in town would line up to witness with multiple night sellouts! Mr. Frandsen also taught beginning band and coached Jr. high football during his years at VHS.
Please help us honor Mr. Vukmanich(Sr.) with a donation to support the naming of a Music Learning Lab as John Vukmanich, Sr. Music Lab. Mr. V had incredible success and influence on Virginia High School students. A native Iron Ranger, Mr. Vukmanich began his teaching career in 1964 in the tiny Northwestern Minnesota town of Lake Bronson. After moving back to the Iron Range, he began teaching High School band at Virginia High School in 1975. He immediately earned a reputation as a teacher with very high standards, and in a couple short years, the Virginia High School Band had earned a reputation for musical excellence. Mr. Vukmanich also established a rigorous marching band program, the Virginia Marching Blues, who became renowned for their precision street marching, field shows, and showmanship. The Marching Blues won critical acclaim both in Minnesota and nationwide competing against the best bands in the nation. While the Marching Blues achieved some of the highest accolades as Aquatennial Grande Champion, Hopkins Raspberry Festival Champion, MN Prep Bowl Select Band, and Calgary Stampede Field Champions, the root of the program remained the concert bands, who earned Superior Ratings, the highest rating allowed, in all years of competition. Numerous students of Mr. Vukmanich went on to careers in music and the music industry. Retiring in 1999, his band legacy lives on as one of uncompromising excellence and devotion to music as a discipline and art form.
Please help us honor Mr. Lavato with a donation to support the naming of a Music Learning Lab – Bill
Lavato Music Lab. Mr. Lavato spent countless hours teaching and directing band, first in the Eveleth School District and finishing his career in the Eveleth-Gilbert District. He started teaching in 1966 and
retired in 1999. He was more than just a Monday – Friday, 7:00-3:00 teacher. He never missed an opportunity to bring his band to sporting events to help pep up the games! His bands marched in numerous
parades in the summer. The Eveleth band took it’s first trip to Florida in the Spring of 1980 under his direction and he had the honor of taking kids for the years that followed. These bands always won awards and performed like pros. His patience and kindness never went unnoticed. He spent countless hours teaching kids for many years how to play many different instruments, with before school practices and after school lessons.