While some sports are wrapping up their seasons, others are just kicking theirs off. With that, there has been talk among athletes and coaches regarding the differences in financial support between various sports.
How exactly are each of Clover Hill’s athletic teams funded? According to the Clover Hill coaches, funding for team necessities come from a mixture of fundraisers as well as from the school’s athletic department. According to those same coaches, they believe some sports get more financial aid than others, especially through the athletic department.
When it comes to the income received through fundraising, baseball and wrestling coach Brett Mooney, as well as coach Scott McCandlish, use the program “Athletic Booster Club”. Mooney says this application helps raise money, and large amounts of it are then put back into a check used for student activities and athletics. Using this, baseball alone raises around $10,000 a year.
For boys volleyball and girls soccer, coach Charles Anderson says that the athletic department covers everything they need. The deal might sound sweet, but there is a catch: that is not the case for every team. Mooney says his teams do not receive that much money from the athletic department.
“The school doesn’t really provide much money directly to athletics,” Mooney said.
Having said all this, it is rather obvious that the athletic department plays a large role in the unintentional discriminatory funding. David Zyglocke, head of the athletic department, sheds some light on the behind the scenes aspect of distributing funds. The department covers the essentials for players such as uniforms and equipment, but regarding anything beyond that, the county only pays for transportation.
“We have a general pot of money that covers uniforms, equipment, officials’ bills, etcetera, and the only thing covered by the county are buses,” Zyglocke said.
Most believe the lack of funding from the athletic department is a prevalent issue and it could be a reason why the student body chooses not to entertain school sports outside of football. Since the beginning of this school year, Principal David Altizer has been working hard to motivate students on the Hill to show up and support their peers. His goal is to improve school spirit and make sporting events a fun environment for spectators and players.
“The big goal is to increase the intensity of which we’re trying to promote these events,” Altizer said.
So with the two main issues being a financial divide and a lack of school spirit, the question at hand is where to begin regarding the annihilation of this issue? Maybe it is time to rethink how dollars are being divvied.
