CNU senior women's lacrosse player, Stephanie Green, gives fans a look at life as a Division III student-athlete. Balancing school work, practice and much, much more, Green provides an inside look in her weekly blog "Off the Field With Stephanie Green"
"AdaptLAX: The Good, The Bad & The Ugly"
Sometimes it's hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Did you ever have a point last semester where you felt like the semester just was not going to end? There was a time back in October where I thought the school week was 11 days long and I'd never get past it! Unfortunately, this same feeling, of not being able to see the end in sight, has been a feeling that I've had quite often throughout college. It's been directly associated with my program AdaptLax.
During the past two and a half years of developing my adaptive lacrosse program, I have reached astounding peaks. LAX WORLD, Behind the Back Sports, and Warrior Lacrosse have generously given me verbal support. I've had the support and help from CNU Women's Lacrosse coaches, the Hampton Roads Teen Center, Newport News Therapeutic Recreation and Parks, and Riverside Elementary. I've been able to observe the success of current adaptive lacrosse programs in Maryland, such as the Davidsonville and Parkville Adaptive Lacrosse Programs. I've gotten monetary and equipment donations. I even have a running Facebook page and business cards!
You may be thinking though, "This all sounds perfect, what's stopping you? Why haven't you gotten this program off the ground?" Trust me, after two and a half years, I've thought the same thing. While I've had so much work in my favor, I've had just as much, if not more work against me.
The establishment of the program itself has been the biggest challenge. First, I contacted the Special Olympics and asked them for support with the development of my program. Unfortunately, they saw lacrosse as an extremely dangerous contact sport, which was not appropriate for the Special Olympics. Then I tried working with the Hampton Teen Center, making AdaptLax a program for teens in the area. However, this method would create more of an “After School” program which did not target the specific demographic I hoped to reach. I wanted to focus my time on those with physical and/or cognitive disabilities. After that, I attempted to put AdaptLax under a currently established lacrosse program, like a Maryland adaptive lacrosse program. Yet, this option fell apart with local lacrosse leagues for numerous reasons. Concerns arose about how to financially support such program with an already limited amount of resources. Moreover, these local lacrosse programs felt they may lack the proper knowledge to adapt a sport to children with disabilities. My best option came with a therapeutic after-school program in the Newport News area, which focused its efforts on reaching out to the “disabled community”. Unfortunately, contact with this organization diminished and this plan of action eventually fell through as well. It felt like all of my options were exhausted and there was no hope for AdaptLax to become a full-functioning program.
On top of this challenge came financial strains. How was I going to fund this? The $2000 CNU Ferguson Fellowship was helping, but was not going to be enough to get this thing up and running. I needed more financial support. Big name organizations such as LAX WORLD and Warrior Lacrosse were all for helping me out financially once my organization was established. But like I just said, I couldn't get AdaptLax started!! I WAS IN A CONTINUOUS STAGNANT CYCLE AND ADAPTLAX WAS GOING NO WHERE!
Luckily, my mentor and biggest supporter, Coach
Carolyn Raveia, has kept me grounded throughout this process. She has helped me realize that each small step on this long journey will get me closer to eventually having lacrosse sticks in the hands of these children. As I embark on my last semester at CNU, it will be imperative to maintain these positive thoughts and understand that every little accomplishment is a victory moving me closer to my dream—AdaptLax.
The next step and blog post is to “Look to the Future” to see the amazing things in store for AdaptLax.
