Ricky Hall, the woodshop teacher at West Albany High School (WAHS), has been raising money for the pole vaulting team with small businesses across town.
“I [first] started with the cider press, because I’ve used that fund to go to woodshop, but a parent of one of my students donated some money to [it] this year, so I decided to set aside the money from the cider press for the football team,” said Hall. “The other way is I can contact local businesses. I like to find local businesses that would [maybe] be interested in supporting, because they’re local to Albany. I know a lot of them, and I call them and ask, [but] I don’t know how to contact the people that I need to contact at that business. They might say, ‘Oh, here’s the person,’ and then I don’t really know how to get a hold of that person. So I’ll call them, and most of the time [I get] ‘oh yeah, it kind of sounds good,’ and then never hear anything back.’’
Hall has sponsored the team with several companies and businesses across town, including (but not limited to) Hendrix Heating, Burcham’s Metals, Southpaws, and Sarah Gibb Realty, the owner of which happened to be the parent of one of West Albany’s pole vaulters.
“Last year I had two people sponsor us, and then this year I had one. This year, we’re bringing in eleven poles. Last year, there were six poles, but the poles last year were bigger, so they [were] more expensive, and this year they’re looking smaller, that’s why we got more this year. Monetarily wise, it was a little bit more this year, [but] just a little bit,” Hall said.
“Also, sometimes I’ll do a side job, woodworking, and the money that I make from that, if I profit off it, [but] usually it’s a friend or somebody that I make it for, something where I don’t try to profit off it. But if I [do] make a little money off it, it goes into that, and then bottles and cans go through that too.’’
Hall went on to explain why he started fundraising. “So this is actually only my second year coaching that student [who] came to me last year, [junior] Beau Harvey, and he’s like, ‘our coach left us to coach in college, can you coach?’ Because he heard that I coached in high school, and I said, ‘okay’, so I decided to do that,” Hall said.
“When I got out there, I realized that we don’t have a lot of poles. Poles are specific to your body weight and how [experienced] you are. There are different lengths, and there are different flexibilities of them depending on your body weight. We didn’t have a lot that weren’t beginner poles. [Harvey] was the best [vaulter], and he didn’t have a pole. Then he’s like, ‘Well, maybe my dad’s company could sponsor a pole.’ That was halfway through the year when he said that, [and] I never even thought about that. So [when] I thought about asking businesses to sponsor, that’s how that started.’’
Hall’s goal most years is to raise as much money as possible so that every pole vaulter can get a pole. ‘’That’s the same goal. If somebody sponsors five hundred or more. Like last year, I went about it a little bit differently than I did this year, because I didn’t have [as many] sponsorships last year,” Hall said.
“I said poles cost anywhere from six to eight hundred dollars, and so that’s what I was telling the people that I asked [said] poles cost this much. So then they’re like, ‘well, that’s more than I thought.’ [Then] Hendrix called me back and said, ‘How many do you need?’ I didn’t think anybody would ask me that, because I haven’t heard back from anybody. So I said, ‘I don’t know,’ and she [said], ‘how about two for now?’ So then they sponsored $1,600. Then Burcham sponsored one. Then this year I changed it up to make it not sound so extreme. If they sponsor 500 or more, they can get a sign that’s two foot by four foot out of the stadium that has their track sponsored, and it shows their company logo, and everything is phone numbers or whatever they want to put on there. So [then] I said, ‘Any [amount] 500 or more.’ So the realtor gave us 500 this year, and then Southpaws [too].’’
