By Eric McDonald
With the BYU Fencing Club growing in popularity and size, a petition has begun to restart fencing classes cancelled many years ago.
While the issue is far from controversy, David Hatch, assistant fencing club advisor, said it would be nice to find a way to get the classes going again.
?We should be able to find some way, even if both sides have good reasons,? Hatch said.
The fencing class was cancelled about six years ago. This caused significant distress on fencing enthusiasts attending BYU, such as Bethany Andrews.
Andrews chose to come to BYU because of the fencing program and the LDS environment, she said. When the fencing program was cancelled her freshman year, she was upset.
?My other choice was Stanford,? Andrews said, ?which also has a great fencing program. ? Julie Seal and I decided that something as cool as fencing should stay in Utah.?
The two, with the help of other friends in the community, started what is now Utah Valley Sport Fencing, the first fencing school in Utah.
?If you wanted to learn to fence back then you had to at school,? Andrews said.
Despite the dissolution of the fencing classes, the fencing club has continued the tradition of teaching the art of fencing to interested students. The club has had between 30 and 40 members weekly.
There are numerous disadvantages to teaching fencing under a club status, said Brent Smith, advisor for the fencing club. The students aren?t allowed to do anything off-campus as a BYU affiliated club.
?If it were an organized, sponsored sport, there would be greater opportunities to participate as a team,? Smith said.
So while the opportunity is limited, many students still do what they can to practice fencing. According to David Hatch, fencing is physically demanding and a lot of brainwork.
?It?s like chess at 90 miles per hour,? he said.
Andrews, who has been fencing for more than a decade, said fencing is one of the greatest sports ever.
?To me, fencing is the perfect mix of what you have to do with your body and what you have to do with your mind,? she said. ?For my own personal fencing, it?s something that you could never be perfect at because there?s always something more you can learn.?
While fencing has been popular as a recreational sport, the class was discontinued because of a variety of issues facing BYU.
?We don?t have the facilities, we don?t have the equipment and we don?t have the instructors,? said Sharron Collier, department secretary for Exercise Science.
With the addition of the new Joseph F. Smith building, it is anticipated that more classroom space will become available. But finding the funds to equip the class, as well as funding for any qualified teacher may yet prove difficult.
Diane Chamberlain, associate dean for health and human performances, was able to elaborate.
?We were having to hire part-time faculty year in and year out and it was getting to be more difficult with equipment, faculty, and maintaining and keeping the equipment,? Chamberlain said.
Generally, instructors are required to have a master?s degree in order to teach a particular subject at BYU.
?We like to have faculty members with expertise in the area that we teach,? Chamberlain said.
All activity classes at BYU are funded through a budget line that comes through the university to handle classes. This means there is a finite amount of money available to be distributed between classes.
?We have to decide which things to support and what is on demand,? Chamberlain said.
Despite these obstacles, David Hatch said he still hopes some compromise can be reached.
?I?d love to see them do a trial course, just to see what interest students would have,? he said.
Fencing club advisor Brent Smith concurred, saying the fencing classes were full when they were offered at BYU.
?We have facilities for other sports on campus,? he said. ?Fencing is a great lifelong sport and I know people who keep it up for life.?
The fencing club meets on the 3rd floor of the Wilkinson Student Center Tuesday nights at 8:30. Guests are welcome to come and watch or give fencing a try.