By Ryan Fournier
Within a month, College administration hopes to make a decision on the addition of swimming and golf teams to its list of athletics, said Rick Ross, associate dean for athletics and student life. Plans for new academic programs may be not much further down the line.
Nothing is certain yet, though a variety of options are on the table in an effort to boost enrollment at the College after years of falling numbers.
“We’re exploring our options and doing our due diligence,” explained President Luke Robins. No decisions are final until a budget is hammered out in February.
The College is considering an arrangement with Centralia College and Grays Harbor College, in which the three schools would host three health and medicine-related programs on a rotating basis.
The consortium would allow the rural Colleges to train students in a given field for a few years, then rotate programs so as not to over-saturate their communities with a single type of medical professional.
Perhaps on the horizon as well are e-sports, otherwise known as video games.
Competitive video gaming is a spectator sport. As such, an e-sports program would include some kind of audience arena. Ross said this could be in one of the College’s theaters, or perhaps the lecture hall in M125. “It might be moving a bunch of TVs into J47,” and forming a kind of “command center,” he pictured.
Other sports leave less room to wonder.
A swim team would use the William Shore Memorial Pool in Port Angeles. Furthermore, talented local high school teams provide a ready source for recruitment, according to Ross. “We feel like we could compete in swimming right away,” he said.
As the NWAC does not include swim teams, PC swimmers would be members of the National Junior College Athletic Association. Qualifying students would compete nationally against four-year schools.
The Cedars At Dungeness would host a golf team, and PC has talked with local golf pros Bill Shea and Garrett Smithson about coaching. Ross says the pros are “enthusiastic.”
“[Student athletes] make up a lot of campus life,” said Mitch Freeman, head men’s basketball coach. He welcomed the idea of having more of them around.