Three NH teams compete in Sports for Life Bowling Tourney; Martin strikes out competition with impressive win

 Sports for Life Bowling Tourney took place on February 24 at the Forest Hill Lanes, three teams from North Harford participated in the event with Jean Martin placing first in the Chesapeake Division for women bowlers with a score of 78.

     Eleven Harford County high schools with 90 student athletes were divided into two divisions based on ability. The Susquehanna division used the bumpers and the Chesapeake division didn’t use the bumpers. In the Susquehanna division North Harford placed 7th with 334 points and in the other division NH placed 4th with 244 points.

     This event first started many years ago when they first started offering sports for the special needs students, Victoria Bridges a paraeducator and a coach for the bowling teams provides the background on the sport. “We have bocce ball in the fall, and in the winter, we have bowling. We are planning on doing cornhole in the spring, starting on March 15.” Junior Andrew Mohr adds, “for cornhole they will have practices on Tuesdays and then the final tournament is in May.”

     Students who participated in the bowling tournament are from the life skills class, along with three peer helpers Sophomore Clay Lawrence, Junior Andrew Mohr, and Senior Tristan DeVoe who were assigned a team. In Mohr’s experience, “I helped pick up the ball or tell them where to stand, sometimes I even gave them pointers on how to bowl.” Mohr volunteered because he wants to be a special educator when he gets older, this event aided him in gaining experience for his future job. “I know all the kids in the special needs room so I thought it would be nice for them to have another helping hand.”

     Practice for this event took place in the mornings so all of the life skill students could participate. “We have plastic pins so students could practice once or twice a week to get prepared for the event,” explained Bridges.

     Junior Jean Martin’s favorite moment from the event was, “when I won, I got a trophy.” Sara Testerman, another Paraeducator, enjoyed “seeing the excitement on their faces that we were back in person and actually able to do the tournament, seeing Jean win was very exciting too.” Martin enjoyed her experience on her team with “Kortney and Leah.”

     Bowlers on the North Harford team include Leah Arthur, Kortney Dongarra, Jean Martin, Mikayla Reed, Sam DiBastiani, Zach Newsome, Christian Marbel, Ethan Morris, Joel Reed, James Wagner. At the event, North Harford had the largest team with three bowling lanes. During the event Bridge’s position as a coach was to “oversee the students and give them pointers on what they were doing and how to do it. I used to bowl years ago so I had some guidance to share.”