As part of Volleyball BC’s 50th Anniversary provincial outreach, long time volleyball coach and advocate, Rob Graham, applied to host volleyball training on Cortes Island, one of the Northern Gulf Islands located between Vancouver Island and the mainland of British Columbia. In addition to hosting training, part of Graham’s long term vision was to implement a summer outdoor Atomic volleyball program that would complement the indoor Atomic program that runs through the winter.

Coach Henry Wong and Roz Campbell, Volleyball BC’s Regional Development Manager, worked with teachers at Cortes Island Elementary and Junior High School in Spring 2015. The goal of this school visit was to introduce fun volleyball-based games to elementary school teachers, grade 1 and up, and help them feel confident introducing the sport at a younger age. “It was great running sessions for them and all of the teachers actively participated, which was awesome!” recalls Campbell, whose role is to support the development of Atomic volleyball programs province-wide, “I was floored with how talented some of the kids were for their age. It was incredible!”

According to Graham, teachers on Cortes Island do not often have the opportunity to host sport-related professional development opportunities, but the chance to work with Wong and Campbell helped to upgrade their skills, build their confidence, and showed them that students could begin developing volleyball skills at a young age – and have fun doing it. The school clinic seemed to leave an impression on some of the students, as Graham observed, “I noticed that some youth who had never shown an interest in volleyball before actually came out and joined the summer program.”

Momentum from the spring-time school session carried on as Graham and Jodi Peters, sport coordinator with the Cortes Community Health Association (CCHA), offered a five-week outdoor Atomic volleyball program through July and August. Twenty youth (14 boys and 6 girls) ranging in age from 8 to 14 years old signed up for this program. A Volleyball BC start-up grant helped the CCHA purchase outdoor volleyball nets, lines, and balls. The coaching duo of Graham and Peters worked well, as Graham coached the older, more advanced participants, while Peters worked on developing fundamental movement and volleyball skills with the younger beginners.

Rather than focus on competition, Graham and Peters designed this program to emphasize skill development and to maximize opportunities for each participant to contact the ball through 1 vs 1, 2 vs 2, 3 vs 3, and 4 vs 4 games, while reinforcing the ‘to the net, along the net, over the net’ game play pattern. They also introduced Tripleball, which led to one of the biggest successes for Peters: “I was surprised to see such rapid skill development in just five weeks. For example, when they were playing Tripleball on the last day, we had an amazing rally! Team A had three contacts with the ball and put it over the net, then Team B had three contacts and put it back over, then in the end Team A scored the point! That really made my summer to see this!”

Another success observed by Graham and Peters was seeing the older youth mentor the younger participants. Youth patiently coached each other on points such as how the rotation works, where they should be positioned on the court, as well as encouraging communication during game play.

Although it is difficult to quantify the impact of providing support to a small community, for Graham, one of the key reasons he advocates for volleyball and other sport programs is to ensure Cortes Island youth have the skills and confidence to get involved when they have to travel off-island to attend secondary school, and to stay involved in volleyball for the rest of their lives. It seems their efforts are already paying off, as Graham explains, “Every summer we have an outdoor adult volleyball league; this year we have a few 12 and 13 year-olds playing on teams, and they showed they have the confidence and skills to be pretty competitive with the adults!” He and Peters, a former club and college volleyball athlete, will continue to promote volleyball skills with their existing indoor Atomic volleyball program through the winter, and be a resource for teachers wishing to carry on with volleyball in September.