Development over the summer

Hey everyone,

A few weeks ago i sent out an email to college captains and some experienced women to get their help and feedback on ways to keep beginner women interested in ultimate over the summer. There have been loads of new women join the ultimate scene this year and it would be great to keep up their enthusiasm over the summer and for them to have lots of opportunities to play more and become more confident. I will stick my email onto the end of this post so people can see what i was on about. I was advised to move this discussion onto the forum so that eveyone can have their say and we can start thinking up a few plans for women's sessions, socials e.t.c over the summer to keep beginner and experienced women playing. It would be great if people could post up their ideas of things that would like to see happen over the summer and would be even better if women who have recently started playing could post up their ideas and thoughts too.

If college captains could spread the word to beginners about this thread and encourage them to give their opinions that would be great.

Here is the email i sent out. A few people replied to it with their thoughts so maybe they could post them up here.

Hey everyone,

So iv been thinking a lot over the past few weeks about women beginners that have started to play this year. All the colleges have done great work in recruiting women and keeping them interested and enthusiastic. Personally, I feel that the summer months are the most critical time for keeping up this interested and commitment. Most beginner women do not know enough about things that are going on and might drop off the radar of Ultimate over the summer and not continue it on when they get back to college which is a terrible pity, yet happens most years.

So im putting this discussion to college captains and a bunch of experienced women so that we can start throwing out ideas and plans about how we can keep newbies interested over the summer and really get them hooked in! As it stands, women's teams are going to Tom's Tourney, 8 Nations and (most likely) Windmill Windup, yet interested for these teams has only come from players that have been playing over a year. These tournaments are a great opportunity for beginners to get out and experience proper women's ultimate and meet the wider women's community yet the opportunities are not being taken up by beginners. This might be due to other commitments, lack of confidence, being intimidate by more experienced players, e.t.c so an alternative solution needs to be worked out to continue their interested and build skills and confidence. Maybe im making too big a deal out of this and things may just work themselves out but would be good if we could all start thinking about the summer and continued growth and success.

So I was hoping we could all discuss ideas and plans for things to do over the summer to continue to develop women's ultimate and keep beginners interested. Sp will people reply to everyone with suggestions so that we can start discussing ideas and formulating plans.

Heather

P.s
My ideas are
1. To have weekly women's games/sessions which happened last summer (or maybe it was the summer before that) and i thought were great fun and I learned a lot.
2. Captains of the teams that are going to women's tournaments organise training days (open to all women) and challenge matches, between the tournament team and the rest of the women at the session so that the team going to the tournament can practise against a mix of women. This also means that the captains of these teams are in charge of organising this so it will defo happen rather that people waiting for other people to organise it.
3. Women's Socials... The last one was great fun! More of these would be great so that everyone can get to know everyone else. An emphasis should be put on inviting beginner women players and encouraging them to come, cos it can be intimidating, but everyone is interested in getting to know everyone else so will be great if as many new people can come.

The general feedback to this is that people say YES, and let's not forget about our non-Dublin ladies.

What I am concerned about is all this enthusiasm is here, but its always here, we need to translate enthusiasm into action.
Who is going to actually organise and run all these wonderful wanted and needed training sessions? Who is going to organise social nights?

For social nights, I say, if you want one-just organise it!! I'm happy to help with this, and I'm sure other people are too.

For training sessions-who is responsible for the consistent organisation and running of these sessions? Is it captains of teams going to forthcoming tournaments? Is it the womens co-ordinator? Or is it each of us?

Answer-it is each and every one of us.

This is what was said at the meeting we had earlier on in the year, we are ALL responsible for making sure we keep moving forward. Have a think-have you attended multiple training sessions, made lots of friends in womens ulti? Yes? of course you have if you're reading this! Now, have you given back in a way? organised a fundraiser for the community, organised people going for drinks, even ran a training session yourself? no? then get on it! volunteer to do something and give back. i can think of a number of experienced women who avoid organising at all costs-well, now is the time to just suck it up and do something. If you've benefited for years, then now is the time to help out. Its not a big deal, it doesn't take a lot of work, and the feel-good factor is huge! Plus, an additional completely unconnected reason for helping out, anything you do organisational wise can always be put on your CV and it makes you a better person in general.


What I think is this-captains of teams for forthcoming tournies and people who care about training sessions happening, get together, and be responsible as a group. This will lighten the load for everyone. At this meeting we can decide a time and venue for sessions and draw up some table for who is going to run what session (captains run sessions prior to tournies an obvious start), who is going to help organise the session re publicity, numbers, provide equipment etc. With this, we can also work out day long training sessions and associated socials.

I am happy to host this meeting and am also happy to be on this group of responsible individuals who care and want to make sure things keep happening. I propose we hold this meeting by the end of next week (ie before April 3rd).

thoughts?