After 15 years, Altoona has decided to bring back their intramural sport program.
Intramural sports are sports played between teams made up only from students at one school.
This year, assistant principal Jeffery Shultz, and physical education department head Thomas Palfey, sent out a survey to every student in the school. In this survey, they asked students to rank 11 sports from their favorite to least favorite sport. The sports in this survey included flag football, water polo, dodgeball, basketball, kickball, archery, ping pong, volleyball, pickleball, after-school weightlifting and after-school fitness room.
So far, 10% of the student body has responded to this survey. The top picks were volleyball, dodgeball and flag football. The least picked sport is water polo.
“The phys. ed. department is trying to get people to find what activities they want to do when they get older,” Palfey said. “What we are trying to do is to find an in between where we can get some of those people who are more interested in team sports, and then eventually have them try out for a sport.”
Palfey is using his phys. ed. students to help out with the decisions being made.
“I’m going to try and ask around my classes, not from the people that play sports, but the people that seem to enjoy them here and see what works best for them,” Palfey said. “If it [should be] an after school program, or [if] we should come back 6-8 p.m. at night after the gyms are done. Then we would go from their poll. We have a lot more to discuss, but I’m going to do that with the kids and get their help.”
Senior Isabelle Wolford and sophomore Devlin Miller both partake in competitive sports. However, they feel intramural sports would benefit athletes as well as average students.
“I think it would be a lot less competitive compared to the other sports Altoona has, but I think it would create a more fun and chill environment for students to be able to enjoy themselves,” Wolford said.
“These sports would 100 percent be beneficial for students,” Miller said.
There will be more information coming out about the intramural sports program in the future.
