There are a handful of elements that will lead to the successful establishment of a team. Here’s a checklist. There are more details for each of these below.
Organizers (1 player, 1 teacher, 1 coach)
Recognition from your School
Equipment
Recruitment and Promotion
Practice
Getting Connected to Other Teams
Games and Tournaments
Maintaining the team Year to Year
Building Your Team for the Future
In order to get your team off the ground, you need to have the right organizers. At the very least, you must have a player, a teacher, and a coach. Each of those people has a different role in organizing your team.
The Player – The player organizer is often the catalyst for the team and is the organization’s person on the ground. The player is able to spearhead recruiting and many of the leadership responsibilities. The role is essentially a captain.
The Teacher – It is essential to have a teacher involved in the team’s organization. The teacher can be the team’s liaison with the school’s administration and help the team become an official club and get field space and other resources from the school. The teacher’s role is mostly that of sponsor. Don’t be afraid to ask a teacher to be the sponsor for your Ultimate club.
The Coach – The coach will provide legitimacy and instruction for your team. It is often difficult to be taken seriously as a player/coach and so an adult coach helps. The coach will also serve to limit the schools liability and is necessary for club status. The coach and teacher can be the same person if they are qualified. The coach should be UPA Certified.
Getting club status from your school is one of the most important and easy things you can do to get your team started. You will need a sponsor that is a school staff member. Rules on obtaining club status differ by each school, but your teacher/sponsor should know how to do it. If not, ask your athletics or activities director. Club status can give you access to field space, equipment, school insurance, the right to use the schools name, equipment, and financial support. It will also allow you to advertise for your team in your school. Finally gaining club status is the first step in the road to gaining varsity status.
Before you get going, you’ll need to invest in equipment. Luckily, everything you need for an Ultimate team is inexpensive. In fact, the UPA has produced an instructional kit with everything you need including 14 discs, a skills and drills manual, 2 posters for recruiting, a 70 page skills and drills manual, a PE curriculum, and a rule book. The instructional kit is available from our distributor Wrightlife. The only thing you’ll need in addition to the instructional kit is cones!
Promoting and recruiting for the team will have a significant impact on getting your team off the ground. First, schedule a time after school with your sponsor for an organizational meeting a couple weeks in advance. In the weeks and days prior to the meeting, be sure to carry a disc around school and throw whenever you get the chance. Tell people about the meeting and make sure they invite other people. Some people might have excuses like: “I’m not good enough”; “I don’t know how to play”; “I don’t know how to throw.” Encourage everyone: “You’ll get better”; “No one know how to play, yet”; “We’ll teach you to throw.” Put signs up around school announcing the meeting. The UPA has produced some high quality posters for this exact purpose. These posters are available at our distributor Wrightlife by calling 1-800-821-8833 or in the instructional kit. The meeting should be attended and run by the captain and the coach. Start the meeting by showing some footage of high level Ultimate. Recommended videos include Above & Beyond 2000 Mens & Womens, Stacked or the CSTV UPA College Championships. While the video is running pass around a sign-up list to get names, phone numbers, and e-mail addresses. Once the video is done the coach should tell everybody who s/he is and explain his or her experience. That should be followed with some questions and answers about the sport of Ultimate and finally what they can expect out of practices and playing during the season. Find out what the best times for people to play is and set your first practice. The meeting shouldn’t take long and once you’re done, head outside to play some, but be sure to collect your sign up sheet. After the meeting record all of the information from the sign-up sheet.
Prior to your first practice be sure to remind everybody using your contact information. For a new team, practice should focus on fundamental skill building and should include plenty of time to scrimmage. For ideas on how to teach skills and drills, use the Ultimate Players Associations Skills, Strategy, and Drills manual available from Wrightlife or in the instructional kit. Warm up your body and stretch before plying. People will think twice about coming out to practice if their body still aches from the last practice. Have group stretches before and after practice. Stretching prevents injuries. Make sure you discuss the importance of stretching. Remember that practices should be fun. Also keep in mind that is fun to learn new skills and improve. Don’t overload players with new information, but give them enough that they can see tangible gains in their skills and knowledge of the sport. Use positive reinforcement when teaching new players to play.
Youth Ultimate is growing rapidly around the country. Many states already have UPA State Youth Coordinators and State Championships that take place at the end of the spring and more states are being added every year. The first thing to do is to go to the UPA Contacts Page and find out if your state has a State Youth Coordinator (SYC). If your state does have an SYC e-mail that coordinator and let them know that you are playing and ask what you can do to get involved. If your state does not have a state coordinator, e-mail the Director of Youth Development. There are likely other teams in your state that the Director of Youth Development can put you in touch with. Several states also have yahoogroups where youth Ultimate players and organizers communicate with each other. Check out the UPA links page to see how to subscribe to these yahoogroups. The UPA also hosts a teams and tournaments website where you can register your team, find contact information for other teams, report your scores, and find information on tournaments.
Now that you are connected to other teams in your area, you should schedule games. Scheduling a game is as easy as e-mailing another team or the local yahoogroup and deciding on a time and a place for a game. For tournaments, simply e-mail the tournament director and request a bid for your team. Planning for games and tournaments is covered in the UPA Coaching Clinics.
It’s important that when the player/leaders of a team graduate that the team doesn’t disappear the next year. Maintaining teams is an important part of growing the sport so that in the future there are more opportunities to play at the high school level. There are two important things to do to make sure that your team continues. The first is to have a coach and a teacher sponsor who will stick around after players graduate. The second is to have a Junior be an assistant captain. Make sure that the assistant is involved in all of the major organizational aspects of the team and knows what to do the next year as a captain. This will make your transition to the next year much easier. If you have too many players for one team, start a second or “B” team.
One step beyond simple maintenance is actually building your team for the future. Many aspects of building your team are covered in depth in the UPA Coaching Clinic. Introduce Ultimate to the PE department. If people are learning about Ultimate in their PE class they will have a base when they come out to practices. The UPA has many resources for PE teachers including curriculum for teaching the sport. If you purchase the team instructional kit, you can give the curriculum in the kit to your PE teacher. Get your parents involved by inviting them out to games. Parents can be an invaluable resource for your team. They can help with organization, transportation, or help the team financially. Most importantly, they can be strong lobby for your team with the school administration. We even have a site specifically for parents to learn more about Ultimate. Send your parents here to read on.
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