Raymondville High School's marching band is heading to the UIL state finals.

The Bearkat Band won first place last weekend in the area competition. More than 100 students are part of the marching band, including Laura Salinas.

"We're going to state next week. We came on top of the whole state for that. I really feel we can come out as champions of marching band as well. That's something that I really wanted to accomplish, ever since I was in middle school. I've really been looking forward to that," Salinas said.

The competition began on Monday at the Alamodome in San Antonio. The Bearkat Band is scheduled to compete on Wednesday in the Class 3A division. They are one of several marching bands from the Rio Grande Valley competing.

Five Valley schools from the Class 5A division are scheduled to compete on Monday, with finals taking place in Tuesday.

Those schools are:

Roma High School

Harlingen South High School

Rio Grande City High School

PSJA North High School

Brownsville Lopez High School