Watertown Boys and Girls Club
The pool at the Watertown Boys and Girls Club will be home to the new Watertown High School swimming team.
Watertown students will make a splash this year with the addition of girls and boys swimming teams to the WHS Athletic Department’s offerings.
The girls team begins competing this fall, and the boys will hit the pool in the winter. Both teams will begin as co-op teams with Arlington High School, said WHS Athletic Director Michael Lahiff.
The girls team will be based in Arlington, while the boys will be in Watertown at the Boys & Girls Club pool. The girls team also practiced at the pool in Watertown in August while the pool at the Arlington Boys and Girls Club underwent maintenance.
Lahiff said interest in swimming has been growing in recent years with Watertown kids participating in the Watertown Wavemakers at the Boys and Girls Club.
“We do an interest survey every four or five years to see what kids at the middle school coming up have an interest in,” Lahiff said. “We started hearing that swimmers were participating in the program at the Boys and Girls Club and would like to participate at the high school but there was no team.”
When he had sign ups, about a dozen boys and a handful of girls were interested.
“The best way to do it is to start a co-op team and see if it takes hold,” Lahiff said.
Arlington has swimming teams for both girls and boys, Lahiff said, but their numbers are down. Watertown’s athletes will be able to give the teams a boost.
“We will try it for a couple years and see if it takes,” Lahiff said
Watertown participated in a co-op program for girls ice hockey for a few years. First with Melrose for a few years, and with Belmont for a year.
Swimming is the first new sport to be added to Watertown High School since boys and girls lacrosse was added about seven years ago, Lahiff said.
This is a good opportunity for more kids(and possibly kids not crazy about field sports) to join in. This coming year the girls will be having their home games in Arlington I believe and the boys at the Watertown B&G club…the next year after that I believe this(Boys in Arlington and Girls in Watertown) will be swapped to maintain parity(this is what was asked in one of the sub committee meetings). Sounds like a good way to start a new program!
Why do the girls have to travel two towns over? Title IX anyone?
If you look at a prior comment it sounds like next year they will flip and have the girls in Watertown and bots in Arlington.
This is not written anywhere but was asked about in a subcommittee meeting. I would urge the subcommittee to put this policy in place officially with appropriate wording as this is the fair way to go forward with this given the differences in home/away. Please write the SC with your concerns to put this process into the policy .
How much will swim team cost.
The fee for swimming should be the same as all sports at WHS, $320 per student. This covers as many sports as a student participated in during the year. For more info you can contact the WHS Athletics Office at 617-926-7748