NEW SCOTLAND — Students at Voorheesville may soon “pay to play” sports, if mergers between districts go through. Superintendent Brian Hunt and Athletic Director Joseph Sapienza told the school board this month that the district is looking at combining ice hockey and wrestling teams with those nearby. Voorheesville may soon “pay to play” sports, if mergers between districts go through. Superintendent Brian Hunt and Athletic Director Joseph Sapienza told the school board this month that the district is looking at combining ice hockey and wrestling teams with those nearby.

Sapienza told The Enterprise that lowered class enrollment has affected sports programs. Voorheesville’s enrollment historically hovered around 100 students per class; a recent class of 75 students affected participation, Sapienza said.

“Some of the class sizes are small,” he said. “That affects the whole athletic program, in grades nine through 12. It’s just a smaller pool to draw from.”

He and Hunt told the board that Voorheesville could merge a boys’ ice hockey program with the already combined Guilderland-Mohanasen-Scotia-Glenville team.

“Guilderland’s the hub. They’re the original hockey program,” Sapienza said.

Hunt said that Guilderland representatives suggested he make out a tentative agreement to have the district create a self-funded and self-transported team merger — an arrangement that has few cons, he said. “I don’t see any obstacles,” Hunt said.

He asked the board to add a resolution for the hockey merger on its April agenda.

Each school finances its merged teams differently, he said. Guilderland, he said, pays for students and transportation. At Voorheesville, students in hockey would need to pay $900 each.

“That’s not bad,” said one parent, who added that the cost for other youth hockey teams is similar.

“People who play are used to $1,000,” Sapienza said.

School board member Doreen Saia asked if Voorheesville’s school board could approve a self-funded team while Guilderland could agree to pay for its students for the same merged team.

“That’s correct,” Sapienza said. Voorheesville merged its boys’ and girls’ swim teams with Guilderland more than 20 years ago, because Voorheesville has a pool while Guilderland does not.

In addition to the proposed merger of hockey teams, Sapienza and Hunt asked the board to consider joining another small school for wrestling — Voorheesville had only two wrestlers this year.

Sapienza told The Enterprise that the district tries to “look at where the interest is.” He is adding modified baseball and softball for seventh- and eighth-graders.

“There’s a lot of interest,” he said. “We’re trying to keep a handle on where the interest is and make sure we can accommodate that. If there’s 50 girls that sign up to play softball, we’ll put together games for them to play.”

He said that girls play softball in the fall and boys play baseball in the spring. If there are not enough girls to field a team, some may play on the boys’ team, as the district has offered to a dwindling girls’ tennis team.

“The difference is...it would be harder if a female plays on a male team. They would have to compete...to qualify for sectionals,” Sapienza said. “We’ve done it in the past. If we get a good, reasonable number of participants in the spring, we’ll carry it over in the fall.
“This is a mechanism,” Sapienza continued, “to make sure that females in a district still get the opportunity. That’s essentially what we’re doing with all of our programs. For a small school, we probably run more programs than a typical school our size. We have a pool. We have lacrosse. We’re proud, here, that we’re a small school that has a lot to offer.”