Students across the Poughkeepsie City School District will soon have the resources to explore the sport of hockey more deeply through a partnership with the New York Rangers.
The Rangers are supplying ball hockey equipment sets and curriculum to each district school, and through a partnership with the Majed J. Nesheiwat Convention Center hundreds of students will have access to ice to learn to skate.
The partnership is a resource more than a handout, which is one reason why Athletic Director Dr. Jonathan Jefferson pursued it. The Rangers will maintain a relationship with the district and replace equipment as-needed. The convention center, which is providing 650 slots for district students to receive ice time, equipment use and even hot chocolate, has likewise made an annual offer of its facilities.
“We can’t just have one-offs,” Jefferson said of the opportunities he pursues. “Everything we do is, what’s the community connection? This is not a one-off. They’re going to replace the equipment as it fails. It’s a continual relationship.”
Jefferson noted, those relationships are what would allow students who become interested in a sport to be supported as they attempt to pursue it more broadly. He pictures the current elementary students who become interested and acclimated to ice hockey through these opportunities may, in a few years, look to create a club or junior varsity team at the school district and those community partners would be able to assist.
“Everything I’m doing is (judged by whether) it has support for the kids to continue if they’re interested,” he said. “It’s not impossible to think of Poughkeepsie someday having an ice hockey team.”
Representatives of the Rangers program, which is part of an NHL initiative to grow the sport, visited Poughkeepsie High School Tuesday to train teachers and others in the district about ball hockey and how it differs from the floor hockey more commonly played in schools across the country.
Ball hockey not only is a more true representation of ice hockey than floor hockey, but it may be a safer activity. Goals are lower to the ground and sticks are shorter, which discourages the urge to take a full swing with a stick.
“Traditional floor hockey sticks are taller, and because of it kids stand higher and it’s more likely they may swing,” Jefferson said. “These sticks for ball hockey are shorter and they almost make you, just by holding it, be in a more athletic position.”
Jefferson said he’s formed a similar partnership with the USTA, which is supplying the district with tennis equipment. Training for that will wait until the spring. Ball hockey, on the other hand, will become a unit in physical education classes in the near future, perhaps before winter recess. And, trips to the MJN Convention Center will be coordinated through schools.
“If a kid loves ball hockey, wants to get on the ice, wants to get involved with ice hockey, now we have the backing of the New York Rangers and their organization and their partners in the area, so that kid can continue engaging in the sport,” he said.