Throughout
my years I have been a part of many sports teams and worked on a number of
different group projects, all of which require a great deal of teamwork in
order to be successful. I have also been a part of several volunteer
organizations that have set up events in order to raise money, awareness, and
benefit the community. My favorite team that I have been affiliated with was
the Annual District 214 Alternative Basketball Tournament held at Forest View
High School in Arlington Heights, IL.
Alternative schools are a different
path that some teenagers need to take in order to be successful. Their
curriculum is based around the core classes that every student takes; math,
science, English, health, physical education, drivers education, etc. However, they
are geared towards individuals who have behavioral issues, as well as trouble
focusing in the classroom, or other things of that nature. Unfortunately, the
alternative schools in district 214 do not have extracurricular activities they
are able to participate in year round. Over the years teachers from the schools
in this district have put together several different basketball tournaments for
all willing participants from each school, forming teams based on age, gender,
and talent level. In 2011, my senior year of high school I was a member of the
team that put on the tournament at Forest View.
The tournament had become fairly big
in recent years, and there were a lot of things that needed to be accomplished.
Based on Bolman and Deal’s text, the team was set up in a Simple Hierarchy fashion;
however it was more of a hybrid. There were five or six senior members of the
staff that acted as the top-level managers. All the information and big
decisions flowed through each of them before they were complete. Below them
volunteers were divided up into several groups. These groups consisted of
individuals to advertise the event, set up concessions, contact the
participants, organize check-ins, and those to find volunteer referees and
score persons.
I was part of the group that was to
find volunteer referees and score persons. We were able to recruit many
volunteer referees from last year’s tournament, several high school basketball
players from around the area to run the scoreboard and scorebook, as well as
extra volunteers who were willing to help out wherever they were needed. In
total, the staff was about 60 people.
Interesting story. I was unaware of alternative schools in the Chicago area. The school district for Champaign is too small to have such schools.
ReplyDeleteOne of the good things about being involved with an event like the basketball tournament you describe is that the goal is quite clear and there is a fixed time horizon in which to achieve the goal. That focuses the attention.
In your story, there are a few things unclear for the reader. One is how you got involved. Did somebody ask you to do this? Or was there a solicitation by somebody already part of the group? This speaks to the next question. You said what you were tasked to do. But you didn't describe how you knew to do that task well. Did somebody who had done it before explain that to you, perhaps at the same time you were recruited for the work?
The last think is to describe what it is you actually did. How does one get somebody to referee? I assume they aren't paid, that their work is as a volunteer. What does one do to get others to volunteer, especially if they haven't done it before?
I appreciate that the planning is different from the implementation. The planning is thoughtful. The implementation is more catch as catch can. That is the nature of all the events I've been involved with. Your experience follows with that.
I asked a friends father if I would be able to get involved to gain some volunteer hours. At the time he was a teacher there as well as one of the top managers of the team.
DeleteMy job was fairly simple thanks to how big the tournament had become over the years. Over the years Forest View had collected the names and contact information of past volunteers. My job was specifically to send out emails to those individuals who had listed one asking if they would be willing to volunteer again. If they said yes, I would provide them with any necessary information. Then I would notify the group leader who would put them on the checklist and decide which job they would be preforming.
The referees that volunteered were all part of the IHSA. The IHSA stands for the Illinois High School Basketball Association. So they all were very experienced at making calls and controlling the game. The contact information of past referees were also listed in the Forest View data base. It isn't very hard to get the refs to come back despite it not being a paid job. They know how important this tournament is to the kids and are more than happy to give up an afternoon so that they can play.