Patchogue-Medford’s Athletics Program has recently started a Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC). While SAAC is new to Pat-Med, chapters like these have started across college campuses and have been very successful at engaging student athletes and creating a community of sportsmanship and positivity. I sat down with Coach Sturgess, the committee advisor, to ask her about her visions and goals for the program, and the benefits she is seeing so far.

Coach Sturgess is looking for student athletes to be more involved in both their teams and the other teams in our school. It allows the Raider Community as a whole to support community events. Some of the long-term benefits is to build up our Student Section, by involving students going to other teams’ games and instituting the Raider Points program. Teams that bring a group of people from their team, do activities outside of school, and submit photos to the SAAC Instagram can earn Raider Points. Most recently, SAAC hosted a “Rock Paper Scissors Bead Battle” on Friday, October 17th to have student-

athletes get motivated to meet new student athletes and challenge each other to a friendly competition.

Coach Sturgess loves seeing everyone get competitive to earn points and to develop the community aspect of our athletics community. I also had the opportunity to speak with SACC Representatives Colin Jennings and Violet Tirelli. Colin stated that the SAAC program “really brings in more school spirit by having each team collaborate with each other and supporting each other throughout each season.” Violet said that SAAC is such “a great opportunity for student athletes to come together from all sports and show support for one another, and such a great way to show school spirit.”

Pat-Med’s Athletics Program is very excited to see what the SAAC program has to offer in the future. Go Pat-Med!