Boys Ultimate in the Fall on West Coast?

Here is an interesting question for people interested in West Coast HS ultimate. Should boys ultimate move to the fall?

It is my educated guess that boys ultimate will be in the fall in Seattle starting in fall of 2008.

The problem in Washington is that boys soccer, boys lacrosse, boys track, boys baseball, and for some schools boys tennis are all in the spring. The two main sports in the fall are cross country and football. To top all that off less than half the schools that play ultimate play boys because coed HS ultimate has been around for 10+ years.

The final nail in the coffin for boys ultimate in the spring of 06 came when the state association recently moved class 1A (small but not smallest classification) soccer to the spring. That means that two of the big four ultimate schools, Northwest and Seattle Academy, which are both 1A schools will very likely have soccer in the spring starting in 09. Both those schools are most likely too small to still be able to field ultimate teams. The two bigger schools, Nathan Hale and Lakeside, already play spring soccer.

But clearly this is about more than two small schools. This is about how best to get the sport to grow much much bigger. Here are the upsides:

• For the bigger schools including Seattle public, there would only really be competition with football and cross country.
• There is already a coed MS Seattle Public Schools sponsored league. An open Seattle Public HS league could maybe use those fields right after the MS in exchange for HS players helping coach the MS players. The HS kids would get free game fields and volunteer hours needed for graduation. There could be cross over games versus private and non-Seattle public schools on park fields during the week.
• It is difficult to find HS coaches in spring. UW and other college ultimate players in the area would most likely be able to coach much more in the fall as long as sectionals and regionals don't conflict for adult club.
• There would be more coaches available in the spring because many boys coaches could also coach girls and vice versa.
• The independent schools in the Emerald City 1A league with Northwest and Seattle Academy would be much more likely to make boys ultimate in the fall a varsity sport since they would only have cross country and are not likely to add football.
• BC is rumored to want to add boys ultimate. They have a well organized spring coed league. This would not conflict.
• If boys want to play coed in the spring and there are significantly more boys playing ultimate then there would have to be significantly more girls playing. As soon as a school has enough girls for two coed teams they have enough for a girls team. Girls games could happen on diferent days than coed leagues.
• Boys State would be in the fall.

Here are the big questions:

• Would BC, Oregon, and California have boys ultimate in the fall?
• Would Colorado add a boys in the fall?
• Would the UPA move Westerns to the fall for boys? Could we get fields in California for Westerns?
• What would happen with the Minnesota schools? They are a great part of westerns?

What do people think? Is this the way to best grow the sport?

-Mike

How to Build a High School Program

Hello all,

There was something on RSD a week or so ago about how to build/start a high school program. Tiina had some good ideas as usual and of course the UPA has some great step-by-step ideas as well. Below are some of my random opinions concerning how to build a program. Feel free to disagree.

- Get your liability covered. The first question most HS athletic administrators will ask is: "What is liability situtation on this?" If you can provide UPA documentation showing that the liability issues are addressed by a national governing body that is a great start. If you are lucky enough to have a local governing body as well (DiscNW, BUDA, etc) that is even better. It is also a good idea to get yourself covered liability wise.

- Have a code of conduct for your players similar to the code of conduct for the athletes at the school they attend. The image that some people have of the pot smoking hippie playing barefoot in a dress who is more concerned with the post game cheer and party than with playing the game is not helpful in trying to build programs. Try not to sell ultimate as an "alternative sport", just sell it as a sport.

- Communicate with parents. Show them that you are trying to run a healthy sport for their child. Parents can be a huge help with external and internal organization as well as helping get official recognition from a school. When parents see their child getting positive self-esteem from your activity, they will be your biggest help.

- Students organizing: Yes, on the internal stuff but absolutely not on the external stuff. It simply won't seem like a real program to admins, other potential players, and parents, if the kids do all the organizing not to mention that it takes time away that those kids could be using to do more internal stuff. (This is not a put down of South Eugene or anyone else who plays without a coach, this is about making it so the players can focus on what they need to do within their own team situation which in some cases means doing their own coaching)

- Build middle school teams and programs at the feeder schools. That way kids can show up to the high school with more experience and skills and their parents will ask about ultimate Frisbee when they are touring prospective schools. That equals pressure on administrators to add a program.

- Be a coach or assistant coach in another sport at the school (or a feeder middle school) in fall and/or winter. It makes it easier to get kids to come out to play ultimate and makes the sport more respectable to the community. If you want to become a national powerhouse in ultimate help coach football, basketball, soccer, volleyball, or gymnastics at a big school and get those kids to come play ultimate for you.

- Never ever bad mouth the administration or other sports/coaches at your school. Work to build bridges with admins and other programs. If you get a kid showing up for ultimate who has potential in another sport they don't play, actively work to get that kid to tryout for the other sport. If other programs know that you are trying to feed them athletes they may do the same especially because ultimate is such a good cross training sport.

- Be patient. Chances are that it will be your first generation of players youngest siblings and their friends who will look at ultimate as just another sport and will expect to be in a program that is well organized and run like any other varsity sport when they arrive in high school. That is when you will know you have succeeded in building a program.

Hope this helps. - Mike Mullen