Dear US Hockey Community:
I just turned the calendar from February to March and it reminds me of two things. For us in the Midwest, spring is coming and your National Development Directors have been on the job for two months. Our charge is to increase the number of players playing hockey and to improve the level of play in our sport. Let me review what we have been doing during this time:
I. Increase Numbers and Retain Players
During the last two months, I have been in the process of contacting all the clubs on the Hockey Tourist. By the time you get this email, that task should be complete. These contacts help us in many different ways. One, it will help Chris update the list on the Hockey Tourist. Two, while talking to the main contact from the clubs, I was able to listen to their main concerns and needs. Some of these were acted upon immediately, while others will drive further activity. Third and probably the most exciting, is finding that they are playing hockey in places I never knew played. Do you know that we have a player that skips football practice so he can play hockey in Green Bay, Wisconsin? He alone made the calls worth it. Already, we have a better picture of how many are playing our sport and where.
One of the most common concerns across the country was how to get more people to participate in our sport, and how to keep them. If we had easy answers to these questions, we wouldn’t need the development director position. But a number of steps have been taken and will be taken in the very near future.
(1) One of the first things we did was to get our website up and running and, more importantly, current with information. This will be an ongoing project, which we have hired someone to take care of. Check us out at usauwh.com. If you have any ideas please let us know.
(2) The second product we’ve developed is a brochure that clubs can hand out with their contact information to new recruits. We felt that it was important to place something in their hands to remind them about their recent contact with you. That should be going to print very soon. Contact us if you would like copies of this brochure.
(3) The third item will take some work on your part. We would like to send your new players a postcard welcoming them to Underwater Hockey. In order for this to happen, you need to send us addresses for these new players. When you do this, we will immediately send the postcard with the welcome as well as a request to contact us and give us feedback about their visit. We will be sure to send that information to you.
A big hockey hooray for those individuals who are working on starting new clubs. We will hopefully see teams next year at Ohio State University, in Ithaca, NY, at the University of Rhode Island-Kingston and in Scottsdale, AZ. The leaders of these new clubs need to be applauded for their efforts as well as helped anyway possible. Carol Rose is doing a great job informing us when a new club is being proposed. Equipment is needed, and clubs-in-a-box with the basics are being compiled. In the future, we would like established teams to adopt these new programs and help them on a more personal level. We are also looking for donations in equipment, and will try to establish donation boxes at all tournaments.
II. Improve Level of Play
We are also working on our second charge—to improve the level of play—with the same enthusiasm. We have divided the United States into about 6 different geographical regions, as well as high school and college regions. Each region may have similar difficulties, but will find specific problems associated with their area: Houston and Denver, for instance, have only couple of teams within 500 miles while other teams are relatively nearby. Each region will have a regional director that will be asked to follow guidelines developed by your national director. (If you would like a copy of these guidelines, feel free to email me and I’ll be happy to send you a copy.)
I am still waiting for a few confirmations. However, congratulations should go out to Maria de Caussin who accepted the position of regional director for the Midwest Region. We hope that this will help with our organization as well as to increase the number of people playing tournaments at both a national and local level.
We also hope to improve our instruction. We would like to make ourselves available to organize clinics and tournaments. We will also develop instructional DVDs for the beginner level as well as an instructional booklet to go along with the DVD. If you are interested in hosting a clinic or tournament just let us know and we will be happy to help.
III. We could use your help.
1) Keep spreading the word and promoting hockey. You are the ones on the front lines making your club work.
2) Sign up your players to USOA. We need everyone to look at the big picture and help promote our sport both locally and nationally. I hope you see things are being done. The fact is that everything takes money and we need everyone’s help.
3) Contact me if you have any concerns or ideas. You can contact us at Tom_Redig@usauwh.com or Patty_Redig@usauwh.com or call 630-960-1771. We can use everybody’s help.
4) Send me your new players’ addresses. We will send them a postcard welcoming them to the sport.
5) Would you be willing to adopt a team? Let me know.
6) This status report is only going to club leaders. Please share this with your team and let them know what is happening on the national level.
We hope to keep you all informed on what your development board is doing on a quarterly basis. As always, let us know how we are doing and how we can help. See you on the bottom!
Tom & Patty Redig
National Development Directors of U.S. Underwater Hockey
