Skidmore is known for having a good athletics program that competes in many Division 3 sports. However, the vast majority of students are not able to be on the teams, and so a lot of them turn to club sports, to fulfill their athletic desires. Skidmore offers club hockey, club basketball, ultimate Frisbee, quidditch, and sailing, as well as many winter sports, and polo. Each of these clubs are wonderful in their ability to bring students together who share a love for their respective sports at a less competitive level.
I talked to Luke Hirschhorn ’18, who plays club basketball. When asked about his experiences he said, “It's a good community, it's very fun to be on a team, the pickup is competitive, and it's next best thing to being on the team.” This statement reflected the consensus of the people on campus that I asked, as most of the club sports are well funded and people enjoy participating in them.
In the mission statement found on the Skidmore Athletics website, it states that they will offer
“An intramural program that encourages students of varied abilities and skills to participate in a wide range of recreational athletic activities.” The intramurals that I found to exist are softball, basketball, volleyball, indoor soccer, tennis, racquet ball, dodgeball, and flag football. However, on the official application for the intramurals, only tennis and volleyball are listed for the fall term. The rest are spring term sports, however I do not see why any of them could not be played in the fall as well.
Most of the sports are hard to access, as the link to intramural sports on the Skidmore Athletics website leads to a page asking you to download an app, which I did. I went through the process of signing up and trying to join a team, but did not have any luck as the signup dates had all passed, and a lot of sports do not start until the spring, which again was not listed clearly anywhere I didn't even know many of them existed until I scrolled through the application to see what signup dates I had missed. I think that if the school or leaders of the teams want to have more people involved, they should spread the word more, and have posters or other notices posted online in order to raise awareness about these events. The only real official piece of information I could find about intramurals was a contact on the same page that tells you to download the application. I contacted the person in charge, but they did not respond for comment.
As a participant in intramural softball last spring, the turnout was very disappointing, with only 8-10 people showing up to each “game” (a full game of softball requires around 18 people, and thus we never had a full game) and I do not know if it is going to be continued anymore. It seems as if the school does not care very much for the sporting activities that are not very highly publicized, as the websites are severely lacking in information about each club and intramural. I think that the school should actually have a place where people can see information about each club and intramural team, and know when the start dates are, as well as other pertinent events.
I think doing all of this could increase our school spirit, and get more people involved in activities they used to love, or didn't even know existed on campus. I, for one, would like to get more involved, and I hope the school makes an effort to make it easier for people like me to do so.