Me and a buddy are going into our Senior year of highschool and always thought about doing it so we said what the heck, were starting a Fishing club at our highschool. Our school is located at a lake, and river.

Just wondering if anyone had any ideas on events we could throw or things we could do.

Also if anyone has information on Highschool fishing tournments, etc... ( I know there is college fishing tournments, don't know much about highschool ) a PM would be well appericated!

Thanks, Kevin

You do everything you can to build a club. Start in your school. Get a coach or sponsoring teacher to help you get everything approved with your principal. Do not ask the school for any funds. Your funds will come later. I will help you with that part. Here are some steps to take from my past experience as a coach of 36 years and hopefully some of the other Club presidents/tournament directors will chime in and help with some ideas for you guys.
Contact every club on this forum and let them know you guys need help. Be willing to go to a meeting or two with the clubs that respond to give a presentation and let them know what you need to get it rolling. http://texasfishingforum.com/forums/ubbthreads.php/forums/46/1/bass_clubs
Write everything up for your sponsor to present it to the school officials.
Ask several clubs for a set of their bylaws and modify them for your club.
Be sure to put in this proposal that you will be doing 2 fundraisers during the year that may or may not envolve the school. This is how you will raise the needed funds.
Once you have approval, send out a notice to each high school around the area; ask them to join in and form a club for competition. Run copies of your proposal to send out to all the schools that respond. It is best to contact the schools, asking them to allow you to speak to those students that are interested, about forming a club. This is the most important step and it is a must if you want to compete. You will not have enough interest just in your school to have much of a club and it will fail. Don't let that happen; you need the other schools to be involved. Be sure to check the state athletic rules with your principals and coaches.
Start your club with a board of directors. You can't do all the work that will need to be done without help.

First, thanks go to Donald Harper for posting what is probably the best post I've ever seen on starting a club at your school.....

Kevin....you're in luck! Believe it or not, everything that Donald Harper mentioned has already happened right in your own backyard. There are already club teams formed at Smithson Valley, Canyon, New Braunfels, San Marcos, Reagan, Johnson and more than 50 other schools across the state (with more coming on weekly....in the last 2 weeks Elkins HS, South Garland HS, Rowlett HS and 6 others came on board). In your case, we already have permission from CLHS to form the club/team, all we need are the team members and a sponsor and y'all are official. Drop me a pm and I'll get y'all signed up and fishing in the TEXAS HIGH SCHOOL FISHING SERIES....we have more than 2000 middle and high school students fishing in almost 100 tournaments state wide every year.

The series works like this. You will fish in 4 THSFS tournaments throughout the school year; all of your tournaments will be at Lake Dunlap, and most will have between 40 and 80 students from other HS's in the Comal chapter (SVHS, NBHS, CHS, SMHS, JHS, RHS and SHS). Every student who fishes is awarded points, and those points are added to the points from the other tournaments to give each student a year end total. We then take the top 125 points earners from across the state and they fish in the state championship tournament which next year will be held on lake Athens at the Texas Freshwater Fisheries Center. We try our best to award a minimum of $1500 in scholarships at each tournament (depending on donations, some award more, some award less). Our Angler of the Year (AOY) on the chapter level earns a $1000 scholarship, and the AOY on the state level (highest point earner) is awarded a $5000 scholarship. Also, it is now possible to letter in fishing!

On top of the THSFS, we (FSA) fish every month of the year. Every month we have online tournaments (each month has a different target fish and unique hand sign), we have chapter and club outings, we've just started the "School of Fish" to help improve your skills, we offer boat building, rod building, lure making, fly fishing and fly tying classes, discounts on gear and much more.....all for $50 year. Y'all just missed a tournament this weekend at Dunlap, but there will be others throughout the summer. We've also set up a Tuesday night summer league (at Dunlap); fish in 8 evening mini tournaments every week through the summer (6:00-8:30)....points accrue all summer and the winner wins a new jon boat, trolling motor, battery and fish finder.

Sorry to ramble on; drop me a pm and we'll get you started.....

Do any private schools participate?

Do any private schools participate?

Yes sir....I see that you're in Rowlett; so far in your area there are only 2 (Bishop Lynch and John Paul II), but we're new to the Metroplex and I'm sure more will come on board as the program grows. FSA is open to all middle and high school students (college program coming), no matter if they attend public school, private school or home school associations.

If you're interested in helping to start a club team at a school, drop me a pm and we'll have it up and going in no time.

What fun. These guys will have a blast. I commend you on a job well done.