FIELD OF THE YEAR SCHOOLS AND PARKS FOOTBALL
SportsField Management ( SFM ): Congratulations on the FOY win . What are the biggest challenges you faced with the winning field ? Drew Miller , Ph . D .: Prince William County School District has spent the last 10 years installing artificial turf fields on all of their stadium fields , creating a trend in the area where that has become standard practice . Brentsville District High School was the last school in the division that was supposed to renovate its facility to have artificial turf field installed .
They could not do so because of our turfgrass management program and all that our students had accomplished in just the first few years of the program . There was no way they would be installing an artificial turf field on our award-winning stadium field .
The school system worried about equity among all schools in the district , so the original plan was to install an artificial surface . We were able to install the artificial surface on a practice field . With the large scope of two field renovations , the initial blueprint for the bid for the contract did not have the natural grass field in mind to the point where we would have had a quarter of the field remaining to be maintained during the heart of the construction .
This led to major financial challenges that , as a school , we had to cover — ranging from the cost of sprigs all the way to a new irrigation system . We then had to deal with a contractor who was used to doing the bare minimum and not doing the complete job — from proper grading to removing material such as rocks and other subgrades . Additionally , scheduling around the installation of the track as we were growing in the bermudagrass presented difficulties ( we had to turn the irrigation off for 10 days in the hottest part of the summer while unable to mow or fertilize ).
But the process of putting in this field created one of the greatest learning experiences for our students . To face and overcome the challenges and hardships that were out of our control gave our students an exponential learning curve , gearing them for future success in the industry .
SFM : Your sports field management program is different from how other industry professionals approach their field management tasks . How do you approach your program , your students , the challenge of having experienced students graduate each year and the resulting impact on your field management strategy ?
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www . campeyturfcare . com sportsfieldmanagementonline . com September 2024 | SportsField Management
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