College Fencing

[AndrewH]

Thanks for the info! Idk, depends on what my parents want as far as in/out of state, but I think I'm studying out of state.

District Champ... what? I stalk you better than you can fear.

Then friend me already...

And yea, I wanted to go out of state too, just like everyone else in NJ... in the end it came down to Penn State or Rutgers, and the money was the deciding important factor. Think about grad school too, you don't want to be stuck with student loans for 4 years of out-of-state tuition and looking at paying for grad school on top of it.

[Neinteen]

Then friend me already...

And yea, I wanted to go out of state too, just like everyone else in NJ... in the end it came down to Penn State or Rutgers, and the money was the deciding important factor. Think about grad school too, you don't want to be stuck with student loans for 4 years of out-of-state tuition and looking at paying for grad school on top of it.

I'm a wayy better stalker than a friend. I woulda gone to penn state. but yeah money decides a lot :/

Off topic, but what are you majoring in?

[AndrewH]

Off topic, but what are you majoring in?

I graduated last month, with a double major in economics and criminal justice.

[Cerian]

As far as the NorCal experience goes...

I'm at a club that's entirely student run. It does both a collegiate league and some people do USFA more or less on their own, though there is of course coordination when possible. For our first two years all our funding was from dues and hosting two tournaments a year, travel/hotel was out of pocket. During those two years we also happened to have a coach because he was in the area as his GF did grad school. We also had to pay him out of pocket (paid for lessons individually, general practice comped out of dues/tournament money) Second two years a student referendum passed funding club teams and landed us with a respectable yearly budget which allowed the club to cover travel/lodging on its own. We also coordinate heavily with the local club and have a symbiotic relationship with them.

Most other clubs around here have standing coaches and varying degrees of funding: some schools get travel covered, others don't. Some are pretty much all people who just do college stuff and the club is sort of a social group while others have more clearly defined segments that are serious about outside competition. Others don't have these segments (because the coaches can't/don't actively support higher level competition) but at least have some fencers who take up outside competition on their own via their own initiative. Some are near strong fencing communities and some aren't. Some have extensive relationships with some sort of outside non-college club, others don't.

In my experience with this student run club, it has largely been able to run based on the meager strength of the students running it. When I got there it was struggling, but I came in with a crop of motivated and serious fencers. We all graduate this year, and the prospects look pretty grim, both in terms of fencing competence and organizational competence (funnily enough the two seem to go hand in hand here...). From that experience I would recommend trying to get an idea the attitudes of the people at the club. A lot of club fencing will have people who are only serious about collegiate league fencing, and if that league happens to suck, you'll also have fencers (the good ones) who don't care about that and only focus on USFA stuff. There's a list of things I would consider as far as college club make-up goes to factor into how good an atmosphere it will provide for your fencing.

-Are there people serious about USFA comp?
-Is there a serious collegiate league which the club is active in?
-Can I get coaching within the club?
-Will expenses be out of my pocket or out of club pockets?
-Can I work with nearby non-collegiate clubs?
-Does the club provide a serious training environment?
-Do local non-collegiate clubs provide a serious training environment?
-Will there be good fencers around for me to fence?

In general collegiate fencing suffers from the fact that most people can't or aren't willing to put in the time and/or money necessary to make a lot of progress in fencing during college. Anything that helps get rid of these obstacles both for you and for others is a good thing. Don't trust the students to be endogenously motivated to work and train hard. Any exogenous force working to structure, motivate, and enable them (free, good coaching, good competition, or the possibility of bypassing the collegiate structure and going into other clubs that have structures more conducive to competition) is good. Otherwise it's a crap shoot.

My experience makes a good example. I get there, and a ****ty situation turns into a better one because a coach and other serious people magically appear. But we have no financial support so one has to pay a lot for training and competing, and the coach doesn't get enough to allow him to provide really extensive training for people who might not be able to pay on their own or to stay long term or anything so he leaves (for among other reasons as well of course). Then we start getting money, but as the serious students leave/get wrapped up in finishing advanced course work, things start to die. Luckily we're pretty entwined with an off campus club that provides a stable body of decent fencers and has an interest in developing university students for their own livelihood and general fencing wellbeing, but they're mostly vets w/o a coach so it's not like we're in the heart of the Bay Area or LA or NY or something, so the level of outside support you can access on your own is structurally limited here. Some people drive 45 min to an hour to another more competitive club further away, but for a college student that's a chunk of time and money that's hard to come by. All these different vectors impact your experience in a variety of ways, so making sure there's enough stuff nearby impacting the experience in the right ways is important. There are certainly winning formulas of the aforementioned factors that pretty much guarantee you a decent situation if you want it, but not every place is going to have those winning formulas.

[mrbiggs]

However, clubs that participate strongly in USFA competition wouldn't necessarily be that way, and can be a much cheaper way to develop yourself into a decent fencer. UT hasn't produced any As or Bs that I can think of, but a fair number of fencers developed into Cs there in all three weapons, and that's a pretty decent accomplishment for a college club in my opinion. The meets against other schools were absolute jokes with self directed everything, no rulebook present, etc. However, strong (6-18) contingents would travel to USFA tournaments at least once a month, if not every other week, when I was there.

Clearly it's different depending on the area of the country, so I'll amend my advice to take that into account. Meets here are fairly well-reffed and well-run, and provide more opportunities for good bouts than most tournaments.

[piste off]

I graduated last month, with a double major in economics and criminal justice.

Are you going to be a bail bondsman?

R-

[electricepeeist]

As far as the NorCal experience goes...
There's a list of things I would consider as far as college club make-up goes to factor into how good an atmosphere it will provide for your fencing.

-Are there people serious about USFA comp?
-Is there a serious collegiate league which the club is active in?
-Can I get coaching within the club?
-Will expenses be out of my pocket or out of club pockets?
-Can I work with nearby non-collegiate clubs?
-Does the club provide a serious training environment?
-Do local non-collegiate clubs provide a serious training environment?
-Will there be good fencers around for me to fence?

I completely agree with this. My school is unique in that we have a D3 women's varsity team and a men's club team. The administration doesn't do much to support the varsity team -- we get transportation, some equipment/food money, and a small stipend for the coach, but it's nothing compared to similar schools nearby, and the administration is very clear that we only exist because of Title IX. The men's team gets almost no money and no other help that I know of. However, it has (well, had, a few graduated) a bunch of skilled, fairly experienced fencers who are willing to organize transportation and do what it takes to get adequate practice. They did very well at club nationals this year. The women's team works fairly hard and has a bunch of good fencers, but I doubt that a lot of them would do very much without the help we get from varsity status. But maybe having no help would motivate people, who knows. Before I decided to go there, I met a few of the girls on the team and found out that they were rated and had fenced for a few years at decent clubs before entering college. It was a deciding factor, since some of my other options had teams mostly populated by people who had never fenced before, in areas without a lot of fencing. Basically, the people in the club/team matter a LOT.

It's definitely not the only thing, though. If you plan to take fencing seriously, it's good to be in an area with a decent club/coach to fall back on or go to in the off-season. This is especially true if you're in an area far from other teams. We had meets almost every weekend, often with very good club/varsity teams, but I have a friend at a college club in Maine whose fledgling team has to drive hours to fence anyone. The club technically existed before he entered the school, but he's essentially built it from scratch. Having even one enthusiastic person on the team can make the difference between a threadbare team and a nationally-competing one. But then you have the problem of when that person leaves. If you want to fence at summer nationals or JOs, make sure you'll be able to get to the qualifiers.

I hope this was helpful and wasn't too much a rehash of the above posts. I know how hard it is to factor in fencing when choosing a school. Good luck!

[mrbiggs]

I completely agree with this. My school is unique in that we have a D3 women's varsity team and a men's club team. The administration doesn't do much to support the varsity team -- we get transportation, some equipment/food money, and a small stipend for the coach, but it's nothing compared to similar schools nearby, and the administration is very clear that we only exist because of Title IX.

...off-topic, but do I know you?

[electricepeeist]

Sorry for the continued off-topic, but I honestly have no idea. I figure it's very likely that we've at least been at the same event, though.

[epeemike81]

...off-topic, but do I know you?

Sorry for the continued off-topic, but I honestly have no idea. I figure it's very likely that we've at least been at the same event, though.

Or practice...

You almost certainly know each other.

-m

[MyrddinsPrecint]

Or practice...

You almost certainly know each other.

-m

Tufts might have some sort of parallel universe thing going on.........



Some points, in no particular order:

{I spent 4 years at Smith, a club team in New England. I was a squad captain, a VP, and a President at various points--- I was least successful as a president for various reasons. Not all of which were my fault.}

*The policy that worked well for me-- make a list of colleges, and find out a lot about them---visit as many as possible, read about them, ask friends about them-- and consider fencing the same way you consider the dorms, the food, the academics, the size. Fencing will affect if you're happy or not, but if you tear your ACL or the coach leaves, you still need to be happy at the school.

*Terminology: Club teams are Club teams. I seem to have this feeling they're also referred to as "Collegiate" teams, but I could be making that up. NCAA teams are also referred to as "Varsity" teams. I don't know where you're getting "league".

*When you carefully look at Club teams, don't forget to also carefully look at Varsity teams. Some have a great, welcoming culture. Some have really nifty perks and dedicated culture. One has Brad Baker. ...... Some have next to no funding. Some have really scary culture. One Varsity team tells their first years that if they lose to (specific team they go about 50/50 with) they will be kicked off the team (and then obviously doesn't). Or at the very least, one of their seniors felt comfortable portraying her team in that light.

*Club teams may be run entirely by students, or entirely by coaches. The model I'm more familiar with is a hybrid: Students deal with the runnings of the club-- (interacting with the school, getting practice space, advertising, dealing with the money, mailing in forms, writing the rules and regulations)-- And coaches run practice and make decisions of who fences in what. There's usually an understanding that the coach is constant, and will provide help when the student officers are unsure about precedent or who to talk to. It's much easier for the students on these team to run a good show (Although there are several student run teams that have managed to have great teams without steady external coaching--- but it must be much more work). ..... Personally, when dealing with club teams, I'm much more comfortable interacting with schools where the students at at least involved in making the decisions, even if they use the coach to voice them to organizations.

*search other threads on the boards. There have been LOTS of them.

*If you can visit the school overnight, do. If you can manage to visit a practice, do. If you can't, see if you can meet the coach or stay with a fencer. Or at least meet a fencer.

*The college I picked was perfect for me outside of fencing. The college team I ended up on was good for me in terms of culture (It was okay if I skipped out occasionally if I'd pulled an all-nighter or hurt too much, and the people were mostly my kind of people, most of my closest friends were fencers)---- but in terms of competitive level, it was very bad for me-- I wasn't challenged by my teammates when I fenced sabre, and was only mostly challenged by my teammates when I fenced epee. It was still the right decision for me, even though it wasn't perfect. I cried, I complained, I made it through.

[thekoby]

I've been a member of a college club for all my years fencing and it deffinately has its advantages and disadvantages over a college league.

All the other colleges in my area (Purdue University, Indiana University, Miami University, Ball State University, and Notre Dame) all have clubs that are USFA registered, but not all the clubs are fully school funded. I'll use BSU for example since that is my club. The school only provides a yearly allocation for equipment purchases and typically they will not approve the purchase of expensive or large amounts of items. Two years ago I was club president and really had to push the university to allow us to purchase 17 new masks for our beginner classes because the current masks we had were no longer safe (and I proved this by litterally running my epee through one). So most of our funding for things like new score boxes, reels, or our ultimate goal of having a copper piste comes from fundraisers.

On the good side of a club, you are not required to be competetive. Cluver Mens College (site of the Great Lakes Sectional and St. Valentine's Day Massacre event) has a league which requires you to put so many hours of practice in per day and so many tournaments in per year (depending on your level of skill). I may be slightly wrong with that, but I know they are not a club because they have fencing strips and score boxes all over the gym terrace and a whole room with alluminum-plate strips. I love the club environment so much better because you can relax, make lasting friendships, and if you want to take half a season off to focus on timing or whatever you can do so without any pressure.

Now some colleges have outside coaches that will come in and teach classes or private lessons. Purdue University, for example, has a club coach which is their head member, but also pays to have an outside person come in for private lessons. I believe IU and Notre Dame is the same way. So even though you aren't wanting to make a choice of college based on their fencing status, you are on the right track of wanting to know if they have a certified coach available or is it student-taught, or maybe if they have the funding to provide the equipment or reimburse USFA or tournament dues, or even if they are an individual club or a team club.

[MyrddinsPrecint]

WHOA. Let's stop the sweeping generality train before it leaves the station.

All the other colleges in my area (Purdue University, Indiana University, Miami University, Ball State University, and Notre Dame) all have clubs that are USFA registered, but not all the clubs are fully school funded.

I'll imagine there's a school somewhat near you that doesn't have a club, but I'll assume most people won't read it that way, so I'll move on.

USFA registration doesn't matter much for college competition. If you fence at your college, you can fence USFA competitions without the club being registered, and if it is registered, that doesn't mean you have to fence USFA competitions. It's not a useful metric for... well.. anything. I also don't think it's true, since NCAA fencers have a bunch of restrictions on representing a club or not during the year.......

And Notre Dame is really really an NCAA school. See their website. Div 1. They've had some people that don't particularly suck.

On the good side of a club, you are not required to be competetive. Cluver Mens College (site of the Great Lakes Sectional and St. Valentine's Day Massacre event) has a league which requires you to put so many hours of practice in per day and so many tournaments in per year (depending on your level of skill). I may be slightly wrong with that, but I know they are not a club because they have fencing strips and score boxes all over the gym terrace and a whole room with alluminum-plate strips. I love the club environment so much better because you can relax, make lasting friendships, and if you want to take half a season off to focus on timing or whatever you can do so without any pressure.

Can someone please explain the use of the word "league" to me??? Is this a word used primarily in some other sport or some other geographic region??? Because I've never heard it used in this context before, and I'm very very confused.

In any event, they don't seem to be part of any well known conferences or part of the NCAA, so I'm at a loss for what you actually mean.

Since they're clearly not an NCAA team, and they're located at a college(I guess?), they're probably a college club. Which means that there's a huge difference in what each college expects of its fencers. This seems to be true not just in club teams, but also NCAA.

But I suspect it's somewhat more complicated--- I would guess that if you're a freshman or sophomore at an NCAA school with a deep field, as long as you're showing up to practice consistently, the coach might be okay with you taking a backseat competitively while you work on development, especially if you would have had to fight tooth and nail for a starter spot anyway. At Smith, we need everyone who shows up to fence sometimes, depending on injuries, illness, etc. I ended up fencing all day with what I thought was the flu because of a strong pressure to compete because we didn't have anyone else. Clearly this is not the case everywhere on either count.

Now some colleges have outside coaches that will come in and teach classes or private lessons. Purdue University, for example, has a club coach which is their head member, but also pays to have an outside person come in for private lessons. I believe IU and Notre Dame is the same way. So even though you aren't wanting to make a choice of college based on their fencing status, you are on the right track of wanting to know if they have a certified coach available or is it student-taught, or maybe if they have the funding to provide the equipment or reimburse USFA or tournament dues, or even if they are an individual club or a team club.

Uh, again, Notre Dame has a coaching staff. They don't have a head member, they have captains, selected by... the coaching staff. Very big difference.


And while I'm here, with coach certification the way it is in this country in this sport, there are plenty of times when a student will know a lot more than a coach. There were plenty of times when I would take offhanded comments by a (now) ex boyfriend to be much more helpful and much more accurate than lessons given to me by my thoroughly certified college coach. (On the other hand, my college coach was not an epeeist.)

[thekoby]

I'll imagine there's a school somewhat near you that doesn't have a club, but I'll assume most people won't read it that way, so I'll move on.

I wasn't saying that all schools or colleges in my area are clubs, just naming a few that I knew of. There are several small colleges in and around Indiana that may offer fencing, but doesn't really have a club set up.

USFA registration doesn't matter much for college competition. If you fence at your college, you can fence USFA competitions without the club being registered, and if it is registered, that doesn't mean you have to fence USFA competitions. It's not a useful metric for... well.. anything.

Some people do look for a club's USFA membership. Yes, you are correct that a club does not have to hold a membership for the fencer to compete at other events, but in order to host a USFA-sanctioned tournament, they must hold active membership. Some schools hold small tournaments as a way of "cheating" (so to speak) and have their members gain quick and easy ratings.

Uh, again, Notre Dame has a coaching staff. They don't have a head member, they have captains, selected by... the coaching staff. Very big difference.

I was mearly referring to the point that Notre Dame and Purdue (and possibly IU) has someone who is not a student of the university teaching their fencing lessons, but also have students within their club or group that assisst them when they cannot be there or have a larger class (typically their best fencers). I'm sure there are some people looking out there for this nice feature. Honestly, I would love it if Ball State had the money available to hire and outside coach, but since we can barely afford maintain what good equipment we have this idea has been put on the backburner.

[erooMynohtnA]

I was mearly referring to the point that Notre Dame and Purdue (and possibly IU) has someone who is not a student of the university teaching their fencing lessons, but also have students within their club or group that assisst them when they cannot be there or have a larger class (typically their best fencers). I'm sure there are some people looking out there for this nice feature. Honestly, I would love it if Ball State had the money available to hire and outside coach, but since we can barely afford maintain what good equipment we have this idea has been put on the backburner.

Coach Bednarski can always make it, it's his job. He is paid a salary to do it. He's not icing on the cake, he's the main attraction. If he can't come, he'll tell one of the assistant coaches, and they'll help out. I believe it is an error to compare one of the top NCAA programs in the country with local clubs as the same type of thing.

[MyrddinsPrecint]

I wasn't saying that all schools or colleges in my area are clubs, just naming a few that I knew of. There are several small colleges in and around Indiana that may offer fencing, but doesn't really have a club set up.

I understand that--- but your wording was unclear. That was all I was pointing out.

Some people do look for a club's USFA membership. Yes, you are correct that a club does not have to hold a membership for the fencer to compete at other events, but in order to host a USFA-sanctioned tournament, they must hold active membership. Some schools hold small tournaments as a way of "cheating" (so to speak) and have their members gain quick and easy ratings.

The club doesn't have to host a USFA sanctioned tournament to host a tournament. Many college clubs are mainly concerned with fencing other colleges, and plenty of college fencers don't understand the USFA ranking system, nevermind care about it.

Some normal for-profit private clubs also hold small tournaments as a way of "cheating" and have their members gain quick and easy ratings as well. Is this supposed to be in the "pro" or "con" list for the college involved?

I was mearly referring to the point that Notre Dame and Purdue (and possibly IU) has someone who is not a student of the university teaching their fencing lessons, but also have students within their club or group that assisst them when they cannot be there or have a larger class (typically their best fencers). I'm sure there are some people looking out there for this nice feature. Honestly, I would love it if Ball State had the money available to hire and outside coach, but since we can barely afford maintain what good equipment we have this idea has been put on the backburner.

Right, and when it comes to Club programs, giving any information you have about structure or coaching is helpful. This information isn't standard from club to club, and isn't always well known or easily accessible.

I think it's pretty well understood that NCAA programs hire coaches. For that matter, are there NCAA programs without assistant coaches??? I'm sure there's at least one somewhere (especially one with just a women's team?? ... but not the ones I'm most familiar with....)

Also, are you suggesting that in teams with a head coach and lots of fencers, there are some programs where newer fencers are totally ignored by the returning fencers? Wouldn't that be a huge culture problem rather than the opposite being a perk?


I'm still confused with your (and others) use of the word "league". Someone, anyone, please?

[oiuyt]

For that matter, are there NCAA programs without assistant coaches???

Yes.

Coaching varies school-to-school from a single part-time coach to a staff of full-time coaches and non-coaching personnel.

-B

[thekoby]

Also, are you suggesting that in teams with a head coach and lots of fencers, there are some programs where newer fencers are totally ignored by the returning fencers? Wouldn't that be a huge culture problem rather than the opposite being a perk?

Actually what I was suggesting is that from my experience teaching a large class (somewhere between 20-30 members) that I could not keep an eye on all of them to offer suggestions to those needing assistance. Having the extra help really makes it easier to make sure that everybody gets attention during the first few nights when they are just starting to figure things out as well as through the rest of the class in case they have questions and the coach is tied up either in another class or private insruction.


As for your question of league, I was speaking in terms of an actually fencing class where members are required to compete....so I guess that would be something similar to a NCAA club, right?

[Wafath]

As for your question of league, I was speaking in terms of an actually fencing class where members are required to compete....so I guess that would be something similar to a NCAA club, right?

The current nomenclature is "Competitive" and "Recreational". In theory, all active NCAA fencing programs are "Competitive" regardless of skill, since they are required to go to competitions.

There is no common phrasing to differentiate a collegiate club that exclusively participate in USFA competitions vs those that compete in intercollegiate meets. Most active programs have a mix of both.

The majority of Collegiate fencing entities that I am familiar with are not classes, but organized under the schools' athletics department, recreational sports, or extra-curricular activities (eg, SGA).

W

[MyrddinsPrecint]

Yes.

Coaching varies school-to-school from a single part-time coach to a staff of full-time coaches and non-coaching personnel.

-B

*Sigh*. I assumed this was the answer, but since I'm more familiar with scenarios closer to the later, I was hoping for examples of the former.

: P

The majority of Collegiate fencing entities that I am familiar with are not classes, but organized under the schools' athletics department, recreational sports, or extra-curricular activities (eg, SGA).

This is my experience as well. I will add that often colleges will also have PE classes, sometimes for credit, sometimes not--- These classes are (in my experience) not usually strongly associated with the club/team. At Smith, the class is taught by a woman who drops by to say hello to the team once or twice a year, and hasn't ever fenced competitively. One school paid someone to teach classes, but he was only tangentially related to their team out of choice. UFlorida is coached by the same person who teaches their fencing PE class. In all of these cases, the class is capped by the college at a somewhat reasonable number.


My experience that seems somewhat more related to what thekoby is the novice-program type scenario--- that awkward beginning period of the year when you have a lot of new people, most of which won't stick around. Smith deal with it by asking the new people to spend about half as much time as vets, and having the coach lead the practice with vets interspersed to help out. I believe UMass (at least used to) have a novice program where a team of the more experienced fencers would host separate practices for a period of a number of weeks before the new people would be integrated (It may still be going on, but I haven't heard about it recently. Then again, I'm not dating the team anymore either.....)

I'm not sure how every program deals with this period. Are there other approaches other teams take?


One of the HUGE benefits of competitive college fencing (club or ncaa) is that you get to train and compete as a team. It's an experience you don't get much outside of college.