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Originally Posted by ibanezcorey5
Hi all. I am a sophomore at Young Harris College in North GA. I am trying to appeal to our administration and get a paintball club started. I am seeking any and all advice from other schools that have such an organization and am especially interested in logistics.
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As mentioned above, you'll get a much wider audience of people with directly relevant experience to you in the college forum here:
http://www.pbnation.com/forumdisplay.php?f=185
I would start by asking what you mean by "appeal to our administration"...?
Virtually every college is going to have a policy in place regarding student organizations. So first step is go to your student activities office (or website, if there is one) and ask / read up on the policies for starting a student organization at your school. If both a general student organization and a sporting organization are options, compare the requirements and funding available for each.
The important part here is that starting a paintball club and/or team is NOT special. Just do the same thing someone would do if they were starting a badminton team or chess club. 90% of the time that will work out just fine. There's hundreds of paintball clubs around the country so this is old news to most university officials nowadays - other people who have come before have done the hard work for you.
10% of the time you might get some paintball-specific questions. The vast majority of these will be related to presence of paintball guns on campus. Your answer is that you will not keep paintball equipment on campus - keep it with a member of the team/club living off campus, or worst case at a field. Some clubs have worked out official or unofficial "don't ask, don't tell" policies, which basically come down to paintball club/team members can keep their equipment on-campus as long as no one ever knows it is there (i.e. you keep it in your gearbag and don't take it out when on campus.)
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My questions are these: Where do you keep your equipment? (markers, air tanks, filling stations, etc.)
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Unless you are running an official on-campus field, your paintball club/team should avoid owning equipment. It's too easy for it to be borrowed and not returned, or replaced, and despite the best intentions of the club, you won't have anyone who feels obligated to maintain it. Your players should own their own equipment - then they'll keep track of and maintain it.
If for some reason you ignore this advice and you DO have your club buy equipment, most universities are going to provide storage space on-campus, likely in a sports activities building, and REQUIRE you to keep your equipment there and check it in and out for use. Why? See above paragraph - the university doesn't want to buy a bunch of stuff then have it disappear (and they've had that problem long before your paintball club showed up.) But again, avoid the issue: Have people buy their own stuff, blow your budget on playing.
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Where do you play? Your own space? Local fields? Etc.
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Most college clubs and teams play at local commercial paintball facilities. Some have worked with their university to establish on-campus paintball facilities. If your club doesn't exist yet, the latter option is a few years off.
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How much does it cost to be a member of the organization?
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Most clubs are free or near free. At Illinois we used to charge $5/year as a token membership fee; if you paid it the chief benefit was you got a spot in the carpool before a non-member.
For teams, dues are going to depend on how often you practice/compete, what portion of practices/competition are paid day-of by participants and what portion is paid by the club/team, arrangements with your practice facility, availability of school funding, and other support. In general, you're looking at $100 to $300/month for a serious team.
The easiest way is to organize your club as a student organization with access to a pool of university funding that is distributed by vote of a student body, then get your friends elected to that body.
You might have some success getting some sponsor support from a local business, especially if you can get a child of the business owner on the team.
Other than that, get a job. In my (rather extensive) experience, the amount of time your club will spend on fund raisers, you could have just made that money working.
Note, however, that "working" can include opportunities like manning concessions at events (football/basketball games, concerts, etc) at university facilities.
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Do you have a deal worked out with some distributer to get discounted paint or equipment? Do you use compressed air or CO2? What kind of filling station do you have? Where do you get your respective types of air?
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Distributors are not going to sell you paint unless you're operating an on-campus field. Other than that, everyone is playing at a commercial paintball facility.
www.ncpapaintball.com
- Chris
