Eagle News

Issue date: 11/18/09 Section: Sports

Media Credit: Thomas Heiss

Media Credit: Carlos Calante

The construction of the Recreation Outdoor Complex, or the ROC for short, adds to the facelift of the always-molding FGCU.

With the physical wellness of the average student in mind, the brain trust of Campus Recreation aims to add a second basketball court and two sand volleyball courts to the area between Alico Arena and the tennis complex. The project involves resurfacing and painting the already existing naked basketball court while also supplementing the turf with lights.
In keeping true to the evolving, brand-seeking nature of the campus, Intramural Coordinator Michael Howard explains how the renovation fulfills voluminous functions.

"The lone basketball court looked like a helicopter pad before, while everything else around it is beautiful. It was unsafe, and we're trying to make it more accommodating … we are also trying to expand programming (with intramurals)," Howard said.

Targeting the beginning of this December as a completion date, the inner circle behind the ROC - a cast that includes Howard, Dr. Michael Rollo (Vice President of Student Affairs), Dr. Joseph Shepard (Staff Advisory Council Liason), and Felicia Tittle (Director of Campus Recreation) - hopes its enterprise lends itself to the cultivation of student-wide healthy decision making.

"We want the facility to be used for informal recreation, to give kids something to do to keep active and out of trouble," Howard said.

Beyond carrying out its basic role as a recreation avenue for the typical student, the ROC's volleyball courts could be a boon to the potential NCAA women's beach volleyball team on campus.
Approved as an official NCAA-wide sport last summer, FGCU waits for the January decision on whether they will join the collegiate women's beach volleyball conglomerate.

Howard says the possible budding team can utilize the ROC as a secondary venue "if necessary, only in a case where they had to use it."

However, such a quandary is further down the line.
An immediate concern is whether the erecting process of the amenity poses a disturbance for the users of the nearby tennis courts, or to passerby's in general.

It is more likely that students have already become numb to the constant clicking and clanking of machinery, Howard hypothesizes.

"Construction of the facility will not be a distraction to anyone… it fits in with the campus culture as we grow as a University," Howard testifies.

Additionally, construction will take place during the morning hours, when students are probably still fast asleep.

The hope is that the ROC will become a FGCU mainstay, interchangeable with the prominent campus gym, nature trails, and Alico Arena.

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