by Madeline Fetchiet
SKYLINE HIGH SCHOOL’S top-rated Singles player, freshman Caroline Courtwright, helped lead her team to their first girl’s tennis Division 1 Regional Championship on May 15.
Right behind the Skyline Eagles were cross-town rivals, Huron and Pioneer High Schools—both qualified for States after tying for second at Regionals.
Ann Arbor swept the Regionals at Plymouth with all three teams taking the top three spots at the tournament, qualifying for the State Finals.
In Ann Arbor, tennis is a popular, competitive and expensive sport. With multiple recreational and club tennis programs, junior tennis teams, private coaches, nation-wide tournaments and year-round practices, Ann Arbor’s dominance in tennis is no accident. Student players with access to these types of training and facilities have an advantage. Is it an unfair one? Critics say it is. With a trio of powerhouse girl’s tennis programs among the Ann Arbor public high schools, Ann Arbor players often find their stiffest competition from among themselves.
Some suggest this intra-city competition is fueling an elitist athletic arms race.
Marty Maehr, Tennis Coordinator at Liberty Athletic Club, disagrees, however.
“I’m not so sure I’d say elitism,” Maehr said. “I don’t think anyone is playing favorites. I think the best athletes and the best players are rising to the top.”
Maehr has worked with many of the current Ann Arbor tennis players as kids, through United States Tennis Association Junior Team Tennis and private lessons. Five to ten years later, it is no coincidence that these players are not only crowding Varsity teams, but are also some of the teams’ best players.
“The players that are on Varsity are players that are basically playing year-round,” Maehr said. “They’re usually playing tournaments, too. That’s something they do on their own. Playing USTA tournaments is something we encourage.”
But with the high costs of tournaments, travel, and private lessons, it begs the question: is it really the best athletes rising to the top, or is it the athletes whose parents and guardians have largest bank accounts?
Maehr admits tennis is an expensive sport, one that has potential to discriminate against low-income athletes.
“Tennis is a sport more so than other sports, where you do have to have some money to work with just to get indoor court time,” Maehr admitted. “And being a part of a program does cost money, but that said, not everyone in these programs are super rich or anything like that, it’s that they’re motivated and they work hard.”
On the other hand, Skyline Head Coach Tom Pachera sees a definite connection between access to club tennis, and success as a high school tennis player, acknowledging the direct effect early exposure to tennis has on a player’s ability to make the Varsity team.
“The girls that play year-round have the only chance of making Varsity. …I don’t have anyone on my Varsity squad that doesn’t play year-round tennis,” Pachera said.
Pachera has a much more inclusive philosophy about tennis, believing that “anyone and everyone can play tennis.”
But Pachera admits his hopes for the sport conflict with certain financial realities.
“I want a broad socioeconomic and cultural mix of girls on our team, and that’s why we try to keep it one team between JV and Varsity. We order the same skirts for JV and Varsity and everything.”
But narrowing the perception of the talent gap between the teams doesn’t ease the financial stresses of playing the sport, and Pachera recognizes there is still work to be done. While some players can afford private lessons, others struggle just to make it to school matches, and these days, succeeding at a Varsity sport comes with a huge price tag, especially in Ann Arbor.
According to Mark Uyl, Assistant Director of the Michigan High School Athletic Association, athletics enrich the high school experience, leading many players (and their families) striving to earn a Varsity letter, but at what cost?
The Chippewa Club in Ypsilanti charges $75 for a private lesson for club members, in addition to membership fees that range from $250-$915 for families, with steeper prices for non-members.
At Racquet Club, where membership spots are limited, families pay $3,400 in initiation fees and an additional $1,400 in dues per year to have access to some of the best tennis facilities and instructors in Southeast Michigan.
In Michigan, indoor facilities are prime real estate, and in Ann Arbor they’re abundant. Outside Ann Arbor’s city limits, however, access to recreational clubs, private lessons and indoor tennis facilities can be scarce, and so can elite high school tennis programs and state championships.
“You look at a community like Brighton who was a tennis powerhouse for years, now two years after their indoor facility closed, I’d be surprised if they were in the top 30 or 40 this year,” Pachera said.
Taking advantage of the thriving Ann Arbor tennis culture, Emma St. Pierre, a senior Doubles player for Pioneer, began playing tennis at age four, first at Liberty Athletic Club. Her mother, Lichee St. Pierre, said their family was lucky Ann Arbor offered so many tennis options.
“I think Ann Arbor’s lucky, because there’s quite a few clubs here,” Lichee St. Pierre said. “There’s Liberty, there’s Chippewa, there’s the Varsity Tennis Center at U-M. …Rec and Ed has a big program too, and I think Ann Arbor is very, very lucky that there’s quite a few.”
But while some players and their parents see club tennis as a head start and possible ticket to a high school roster spot, others see it strictly as a business.
According to Uyl, high school sports should be a supplemental part to the holistic high school experience, but said the industrialization of youth sports is causing a shift in focus from friendly, educational competition, to chasing unrealistic college scholarship opportunities, leaving many capable athletes off the rosters.
“There are an awful lot of people, making an awful lot of money running youth athletic programs,” Uyl said. “A lot of these people making all kinds of money are presenting themselves in their program as, ‘If you want to play at the next level and get a scholarship to play at the next level, I‘m the ticket that’s going to get you there, it’s not with your high school team.’”
However, both players and instructors agree that early exposure to match play, tennis instruction and tournaments make a “big difference” when it comes to playing Varsity sports, according to St. Pierre, and Maehr.
“You probably would have to be at some kind of a club to be making it with these teams right now,” Maehr said. “You’d have to be working on your game and going to tournaments, and/or being part of some group or program.”
Even though tennis is a non-cut sport, meaning players cut from Varsity can automatically play JV, the undeniable relationship between year-round tennis training and those excelling in high school tennis can leave low-income players and those less serious about athletics feeling incompetent and disadvantaged.
Christian Loepke, Assistant Varsity Tennis Coach at Pioneer, said players have an equal opportunity to earn a spot on Varsity during challenge matches, where teammates face off in a best-of-five series to determine their roles on the team.
“It doesn’t really matter where you come from, it matters what you do during challenge matches, so everyone has a shot,” Loepke said.
Lichee St. Pierre said allowing everyone a chance to play encourages kids to continue tennis, regardless of the level of competition.
“You might not make the Varsity team, but you can play at the JV level and I think it’s kind of nice,” Lichee St. Pierre said. “I know some of the other sports have a limited spot, so it’s kind of sad because if they’ve been playing soccer for years and years and then they get to high school and don’t have a spot.”
But with only a dozen spots on the Varsity teams, those with money and access to non-high school tennis programs usually snap them up, fueling high-stakes competition amongst teammates. Thus, industrialized youth tennis programs which claim to be the best ticket to a future spot on a Varsity tennis team become highly-coveted in the race to make Varsity.
For Emma St. Pierre it was the ticket—she has been a four-year Varsity player at Pioneer after years of private lessons, and playing Junior Team Tennis with the USTA as a youngster.
But in the early 2000s AAPS shifted costs onto parents and impose Pay to Participate fees, leaving some low-income players on the sidelines and making it difficult to even afford school sports, let alone private lessons and tennis clubs.
Each year, according to the AAPS audits, the District collects upwards of $750,000 in pay-to-play fees.
The Ann Arbor Public Schools Community Education and Recreation Department charges a $280 Pay To Participate fee to play three Varsity high school sports. According to Uyl, booster clubs, team fundraisers, scholarships and other forms of aid help subsidize costs for low-income athletes.
Low-income families or districts with high numbers or high percentages of children from low-income households, can receive up to 100 percent need-based scholarships and financial assistance to help with Pay to Participate fees for qualifying athletes, according to Vanda Shadigian, Ann Arbor Rec and Ed Tennis Coordinator.
Some families don’t feel comfortable asking for hand-outs from the AAPS, or asking for scholarships from the parent volunteers who oversee individual sport booster clubs. Those parents are virtually unsupervised by the AAPS and receive little to no training in the AAPS’s non-discrimination policies.
Recognizing the importance of a head start in competitive sports, Shadigian started Fast Track Tennis, a program is for 11-14-year-olds interested in light competition and preparing for high school sports in an affordable fashion.
“I’m trying to get a racket into everybody’s hands,” Shadigian said. “It’s about getting middle school kids loving tennis so they can at least make it to JV, and really just love it as a sport for life.”
Unlike private clubs, Rec and Ed has no membership fees and uses local high school and middle school tennis courts. While Rec and Ed also offers USTA Junior Team Tennis and tournaments for youngsters interested in tougher competition, Shadigian said the focus is on players at the beginner level.
“We focus on making tennis a sport for life, for anybody,” Shadigian said. “It’s getting confidence and believing in yourself that you can do these things, so that’s why we try to offer these entry level things earlier, so they can get the experience and know when they go in there that they know how to play a match, and know how to compete.”
There is a strong effort to make tennis affordable for everyone among the high schools, as well. Both Skyline and Pioneer have thriving booster clubs helping raise funds to cover Pay to Participate fees among other costs, and have ongoing efforts to narrow the ability gaps between JV and Varsity players.
At Skyline, Pachera and Athletic Director Jeremy Barkey believe in one team, often uniting the JV and Varsity teams for certain events in an effort to mitigate inequality and feelings of inferiority. Barkey says they’re “constantly working together” to ensure they’re “running the program how they should be.”
At Pioneer, a free summer tennis program grants middle school and high school players from across the city access to free team coaching and match play, helping to even the playing field when players try out for high school teams.
According to Loepke, Pioneer Varsity Tennis Assistant Coach, kids that participate in the free summer tennis practices have just as good a shot at making a high school team as kids with club tennis experience.
“We do have those kids that have played club and come up through the ranks and USTA players, but we also have the players who just come work with us in the summer at the free program, and we have a couple of those players on our team right now.”
Huron High School coaches could not be reached for comment. Look for Skyline, Huron and Pioneer High Schools to make a run at the state title, May 29-30.