An Active Social Expander: Intramural Sports!
August 31, 2009 | Alicia Ostarello
University of Michigan inner-tube water polo players get rowdy!
“Is anyone here from Michigan?”
Silence swept the mouths of freshmen in the dining commons like the wave sweeps the arms of fans at a football game. It was the third day of orientation, and a boy in board-shorts stood on top of his table, looking hopefully around the room. For a beat, there was more silence, and then a few conversations picked up and the dining staff turned on a Beach Boys song.
College, especially freshman year, can feel incredibly isolating. What do you really have in common with the people around you other than pure happenstance that you both were accepted to and chose to attend this university? When thoughts like this start wagging their carrots out in front of you there is no need to rush at them. What you need is something else in common with these potential friends.
You need recreation.There is a beautiful experience waiting to bond you to your classmates, and you don’t even have to get dressed up to encounter it. In fact, shorts, ponytails, and ratty T-shirts are the suggested garb for this adventure: intramural sports. Intramurals (commonly referred to as IM) are an excellent way to strengthen your muscles, your mind, and your social scene.
Do not fret if you are uncertain about your athletic capabilities. IM leagues welcome and actively encourage all skill levels to participate in their programs. I had not played soccer since before I was old enough to need all my fingers to count my age, and was placed in a novice division co-ed indoor soccer league. Likewise, if you have more experience you can opt to be a team captain or play in a higher division. And being a team captain is a resume builder to boot.
Plus, physical activity helps you clear your mental pallet by insisting you think about something besides term papers, noisy roommates, and meddlesome family. Concentrating on a sport and keeping your mind in the present is like scrubbing the floors of your brain. Once you have everything straightened up and you’ve doused out some of the stressful fires, you are left with more focus for your work.
One of my favorite things about IM sports is because they are run by Student Services on campus, they are designed to work with a college student’s schedule. Games start late, sometimes even as late as midnight, so that you have plenty of time to attend class, scarf down a delectable dining commons dinner, and even study a little bit before you play.
Of course, the top reason to participate in recreational activities and in particular IM is to transform your social triangle into a social dodecahedron. By developing relationships with other participants, officiates, and coordinators, you’ll be able to build friendships and network with people who you otherwise would never meet. And you’ll already have common ground to start a conversation, avoiding awkward getting-to-know you silences that can linger.
There may not be anyone else from your home town or even your home state, in your dorms, but joining an intramural team puts you into the spotlight for meeting new people. The list of sports played are bountiful, such as indoor soccer, inner-tube water polo, softball, basketball, and ultimate Frisbee to name a few. Check out your university’s intramural league (using the school’s search engine usually does the trick) and start playing!
Sources:
http://publications.naspa.org/naspajournal/vol43/iss1/art5/
http://www.umich.edu/~sailum/newSite/2008_02_01_archive.html
I think all of the friends I have left from college were people I met playing sports (badly I might add).
It’s also a pretty awesome to way to get dates.
Playing sports (swim team in particular) is something I sorely miss. It is a shame that my college had neither a male swim team nor, insofar as I could find, any intramural team run through the school. Title 9 did me in, though I still manage to swim on my own time regardless.
Every Sunday the punks and artists and queer kids would get together and play “punk rock soccer” in the park. It was great fun especially because no one kept score, no one could play that well and sometimes it would morph into a big puppy pile (like a dog pile but more hugging). It was a great way for the folks who felt extra isolated to bond without the competitive edge/commitment of IM sports.
For many, many years I was sure that I had not been blessed with any sort of natural sport-related talent. Freshmen year I played on the IM ultimate frisbee team and found my calling. So try it out. You never know.