reasons to join a fencing club

[slowgraffiti515]

this year i am trying to recruit lots of people for our fencing club and i wanted to make a list about why they should want to.

right now its pretty short:

-we travel all over the country for competitions
-fencing is a great way to stay in shape
-you get to meet many different people

i know there are a bunch more reasons but everything i come up with sounds lame :\

help?

[wahrman]

Are you trying to recruit fencers who don't belong to your (or any club)?
Or people who are not yet fencers?

[annacattiva]

Is it a college club? What is your schedule like? What is your coach like? Are there any very good people in the club? When is the club open/when do you practice?

The things you've mentioned are good places to start: it's a great way to get in shape, you get to meet lots of interesting people (I'd leave out the travelling- people can travel if they want, but you join fencing to learn to fence). Adding on here: it's FENCING, and that alone makes it interesting and worth at least trying once because it's unusual. All the usual good things about sports: improving balance and hand/eye coordination, focus, strength and general health...

But how you advertise and what you advertise (and where) depend very much on what kind of club this is and what kind of people you're trying to get.

Best of luck!

Anna

[slowgraffiti515]

the club is open to anyone, no matter their experience. we are a student run, student coached club, and we have had many good results as far as usacfc is concerned.

[Ordway]

the club is open to anyone, no matter their experience. we are a student run, student coached club, and we have had many good results as far as usacfc is concerned.

"Open to everyone" doesn't mean it's the perfect club for everyone. You want to attract the kind of people who will be happy with what you can provide; or, alternately, try to become the kind of club that will attract the people you want to have fence at your club.

For example, if I saw that your club were opening up in my area, it wouldn't do you any good to try to attract me, because I need a club with nationally/internationally competitive fencers and high-level coaching, people who not only enjoy fencing but who train hard to win. (Well, actually it wouldn't do you any good to try to attract me to your club even if you had all those things, because I train where my coach is, end of story, but for the sake of the example...)

If you're student-run and student-coached, you're best off trying to attract students who are new to fencing (whom you can teach at a beginner-intermediate level) and recreational fencers who aren't that interested in competing (or who are new to competing).

Within that group, you should decide whether you're going to focus on being more recreational, or more competitive. If you are more competitive, then your club should train with electric scoring equipment, possibly host tournaments, and certainly encourage club members to fence in USFA events. (And advertise that you do all those things, to attract people at the beginner/intermediate level who are interested in doing those things.)

If you want to be more recreational in focus, then emphasize the social aspect (not that you can't have the social aspect in a competitive club, of course), don't worry about tournaments (or host in-club ones), and perhaps focus on attracting people who don't have their own gear (ie. a positive selling point is that they can borrow club gear).

If you do not own electric scoring equipment, by default you will be more in the recreational side of things than competitive. No serious fencer at any level will want to train "dry".

Are you a college organization? Or made up of college students? If so, try to tap into the college's resources for promoting your club. I'm the coach/faculty advisor for a community college fencing team, and my students promote heavily at campus events - setting up tables at the new-student orientations, "college hour" entertainment events, club days, etc. We also put notices in the college newspaper, and promote heavily by word of mouth. Doing demonstrations whenever possible is a big sell.

You should also decide what kind of dues structure your club will have. (If your college allows you to charge dues; some few don't.) Paying dues actually encourages retention, because people who pay for something are inclined to use it... We charge $40 for the first semester and $20 per semester after that, which gets students use of club gear if they need it.

I've found that among college students, you really don't have to make a case for fencing. People who are interested know they're interested - the key thing is to let potentially interested people know that your club exists. Although having the most outgoing of your fencers be in charge of the meet-and-greet is important - give potential members a sense that your club is a friendly place and you all have fun at practice.

Having a set time and place for practice is important, so everyone knows "Friday afternoons in the gym" is when the fencers meet.

Hope that helps.

[KD5MDK]

Your title is asking why someone should join A club.
What you're asking is why someone should join Your club.

[seven6ty]

To fence?

[The Rose Knight]

this year i am trying to recruit lots of people for our fencing club and i wanted to make a list about why they should want to.

right now its pretty short:

-we travel all over the country for competitions
-fencing is a great way to stay in shape
-you get to meet many different people

i know there are a bunch more reasons but everything i come up with sounds lame :\

help?

Advertise what you have. If you have electric scoring, add it to your list. Do you have equimpment for new fencers to use? Is your facility huge? If so, advertise it.

Best wishes!!

[Beloit Fencer of Old]

Join the Fencing Club
Travel to exotic locations.
Meet interesting people.
Stab them.

[TooLoftheDeviL]

The club is not new by any means, and things like dues and competitive focus are well established. Not to mention that immediately lumping the club into recreation because there is no full time coach is just sillie.

[jessicasimpson]

"all the cool kids are doing it"
"it will make you feel 'Grown up'"

[RebelFencer]

haha, nevermind

EDITED

[statisticool]

this year i am trying to recruit lots of people for our fencing club and i wanted to make a list about why they should want to.

I like fencing in part because

-Force isn't really an issue (the foil only weighs about one pound) so anyone of any age and gender can fence anyone else, so you know it is a test of true skill

-It has a very bloody history, so you know the techniques are effective.

-It is also great exercise! I've never sweated as much as I do in these sessions.

-It is fun.

-Besides a bullet, the tip of a foil is probably the fastest martial movement. You learn what grace under fire means.

-There are also no belts like in other martial arts (you can ascertain the skill level of someone probably within the first exchange in a bout).

-There are more familiar customs (salute and handshake instead of bowing).

-Fencing techniques are very non-intuitive, at least to me.

-You get the thrill of "What if these swords were really sharp and we had no safety gear?"-type of thoughts.

-You don't get knocked out or choked out. I don't believe those are good for long-term health. You generally don't get beat up by your own martial art.

[noodle]

PM me and i'll tell you how to clemson's previous success

[Phaeton]

The club is not new by any means, and things like dues and competitive focus are well established. Not to mention that immediately lumping the club into recreation because there is no full time coach is just sillie.

It really depends on what level of competition you are aiming at. But most (if not every) elite athlete in the United States is at a club with a coach. IMHO the coach makes the club. If you get a good coach, the athletes will come.

There are a lot of people who share my opinion. The fact that you don't have a coach may be a pretty big problem in getting non-beginning fencers. People need a lot more than combat. If you're doing drills all the more to you, but things most of the time pan out far better when you have a coach there .

It may be a little bit silly, but the majority of fencers are going to decide which club they go to based on the coach there if you're looking for more athletes with a competitive focus. If you make the focus recreation and have a strong body of competing athletes things will go well and you'll continue getting athletes. You may even be able to convert the rec guys into serious competitive athletes.

I'd recommend inviting everyone from a bunch of clubs one night of the week to do a giant (for a particular weapon works the best) fencing practice. It doesn't need be club affiliated, but it gives your athletes exposure. There's something like that around here on Monday nights, and it works out well for everyone.

[noodle]

It really depends on what level of competition you are aiming at. But most (if not every) elite athlete in the United States is at a club with a coach. IMHO the coach makes the club. If you get a good coach, the athletes will come.

There are a lot of people who share my opinion. The fact that you don't have a coach may be a pretty big problem in getting non-beginning fencers. People need a lot more than combat. If you're doing drills all the more to you, but things most of the time pan out far better when you have a coach there .

It may be a little bit silly, but the majority of fencers are going to decide which club they go to based on the coach there if you're looking for more athletes with a competitive focus. If you make the focus recreation and have a strong body of competing athletes things will go well and you'll continue getting athletes. You may even be able to convert the rec guys into serious competitive athletes.

I'd recommend inviting everyone from a bunch of clubs one night of the week to do a giant (for a particular weapon works the best) fencing practice. It doesn't need be club affiliated, but it gives your athletes exposure. There's something like that around here on Monday nights, and it works out well for everyone.

for reference, we're discussing a collegiate club.
on top of that, nice straw man.

[theLuz]

Join the Fencing Club
Travel to exotic locations.
Meet interesting people.
Stab them.

ok, that's good

[Ordway]

for reference, we're discussing a collegiate club.
on top of that, nice straw man.

There are a couple of points here.

One (which I didn't notice in my first reading of the original post) is that the club already has a competitive focus (traveling to competitions is a good indicator of that). So in that case it seems that the club would probably want to recruit members who are interested in competing.

I still would advise the organizers of the club to think about what kind of fencers they are interested in recruiting, and what kind of club overall they have. Competitive, yes; but there are more questions.

What proportion of the club competes regularly? Or what proportion of the club would you like to be active competitors? A club in which one or two people compete regularly but the others do so rarely or never, is a very different club than one in which all of the members compete regularly.

What kind of competitions does the club enter? Individual USFA events, or collegiate team events?

Regarding the potential silliness of putting a club into the recreational category for lacking a coach... Here I'm speaking as someone who has "risen through the ranks" over 15 years and fenced at a wide range of clubs, from student-coached to my current club which has nationally and internationally competitive fencers (and excellent coaches). Clubs that do not have a coach are in a completely different category than clubs that have a coach. Student-coached clubs may have members who compete regularly (though generally this is not sustainable), but these competitors are rarely strong, rated fencers who fence in national events or who do well at tough regional events, or who are able to field strong NCAA squads for collegiate competition. That's not to say that they're not potentially good fencers, or great people, or a very enjoyable club... but they're not going to be in the same category as clubs with consistent coaching from skilled coaches.

Let me put it this way. I would not be interested in fencing at a club (even on a drop-in basis) that did not have a coach, because I would not feel that its members would be strong enough fencers to be worth my training time. Yeah, that sounds harsh, but it's true. (I don't consider student-coached to be "having a coach.") What's more, as a coach of a college club myself, I would recommend that my students not fence there either, if there were other options - I would want them to fence in a situation where they're unlikely to pick up bad or odd habits, and where their opponents are being coached. Again, this has nothing to do with liking or disliking the people involved - I would certainly wish the club well. But I would not consider a student-coached club to be a serious competitive club.

So - if you are student-coached, I'd recommend that you focus on attracting beginner fencers. If you want to be a club that has high-intermediate to advanced competitive fencers, I'd look for a coach.

I'm sure there are lots of other factors involved, and someone is likely going to tell me how silly I am! but this is just my analysis of the effect that this one single factor would have on me. Other fencers may have different reactions, of course.

[Wafath]

Let me put it this way. I would not be interested in fencing at a club (even on a drop-in basis) that did not have a coach, because I would not feel that its members would be strong enough fencers to be worth my training time. Yeah, that sounds harsh, but it's true. (I don't consider student-coached to be "having a coach.") What's more, as a coach of a college club myself, I would recommend that my students not fence there either, if there were other options - I would want them to fence in a situation where they're unlikely to pick up bad or odd habits, and where their opponents are being coached. Again, this has nothing to do with liking or disliking the people involved - I would certainly wish the club well. But I would not consider a student-coached club to be a serious competitive club.

While this may be generally true, I believe that there are a few notable exceptions to this rule. I believe there are a handful of student coached clubs that have achieved good results.

Of course, my standard of good results may be far less than yours. I am going to define "good results" for the moment as medaling at USACFC Championships, in either the individual, squad, team or club wide level. This is far from an elite level, but does allow us to compare apples to apples.

Three schools come to mind when I think of predominately student coached programs that have achieved success: Clemson, Cornell and Virginia Tech. (please, someone correct me if I am wrong, or give other examples.)

Each of these programs are predominately student coached, and each of them have achieved success as defined above.

This is not to say that they wouldn't be better off with a professional coach, nor will I argue (for or against) that you would find adequate sparring partners at these clubs; you train for different results than they do. But to tell your students who might attend one of these institutions to avoid these programs seems a bit unfair.

So - if you are student-coached, I'd recommend that you focus on attracting beginner fencers. If you want to be a club that has high-intermediate to advanced competitive fencers, I'd look for a coach.

I won't call you silly, but I do ask you to re-examine your assumptions.

I am sympathetic to your position, but at the same time, telling a student-coached program to look for one is a little like telling someone in the unemployment line to get a job. These schools are often stuck. Some may not spend money on hiring a coach. Others may spend so little as to make it indistinguishable from the first group. Others still are stuck with whomever the campus had saddled them with.

So they have to beg, borrow, steal or just work around the rules as best they can.

This of course leads into a much-larger problem: the status of scholastic coaching in the US. There are so few good coaches working in scholastic programs (for the record, I do not consider myself to be one), and the majority of them are working where there is money.

W

[noodle]

While this may be generally true, I believe that there are a few notable exceptions to this rule. I believe there are a handful of student coached clubs that have achieved good results.

Of course, my standard of good results may be far less than yours. I am going to define "good results" for the moment as medaling at USACFC Championships, in either the individual, squad, team or club wide level. This is far from an elite level, but does allow us to compare apples to apples.

Three schools come to mind when I think of predominately student coached programs that have achieved success: Clemson, Cornell and Virginia Tech. (please, someone correct me if I am wrong, or give other examples.)

Each of these programs are predominately student coached, and each of them have achieved success as defined above.

This is not to say that they wouldn't be better off with a professional coach, nor will I argue (for or against) that you would find adequate sparring partners at these clubs; you train for different results than they do. But to tell your students who might attend one of these institutions to avoid these programs seems a bit unfair.



I won't call you silly, but I do ask you to re-examine your assumptions.

I am sympathetic to your position, but at the same time, telling a student-coached program to look for one is a little like telling someone in the unemployment line to get a job.
These schools are often stuck. Some may not spend money on hiring a coach. Others may spend so little as to make it indistinguishable from the first group. Others still are stuck with whomever the campus had saddled them with.

So they have to beg, borrow, steal or just work around the rules as best they can.

This of course leads into a much-larger problem: the status of scholastic coaching in the US. There are so few good coaches working in scholastic programs, and the majority of them are working where there is money.

W

couldn't have said that better myself.

also, it kind of depends on how you view cornell. cornell women have a coach.

clemson and, afaik, VT, neither have coaches nor have nearby non-college-affiliated fencing clubs.