Campus leadership introduces new activity, encourages involvement

With intramural German handball starting, Nov. 19-Nov. 21, high school students gather in the FC gym during lunch to observe and cheer on six opposing teams of players.

Students organized themselves into teams that required a mixture of both boys and girls. For three days, the teams will play each other until one team comes out on top.

Teaching leadership for three years, Aubri Foster and the students in her leadership class collaborated on choosing which intramural sport to play this year.

“German handball,” Foster said, “was suggested at one of our activities meetings on Thursdays. The leadership class voted on many options and this one won.”

The leadership students composed a list of varying different sports and each grade level votes on which sport they think would be the best, or what they would like to play. After voting, German Handball won.

Though not very well heard of, German handball can be traced back to 1917 where it was created by Max Heiser, Karl Schelenz and Erich Konigh as an alternative to soccer. Though now it is mainly played by men, it was originally created as a women’s sport. By 1920, what was originally just an entertaining game was now being introduced as something more.

Games began in German cities like Berlin and quickly spread to other parts of the world. Quickly recognized as a serious competitive sport, German Handball was introduced in the Olympics in the summer of 1936. It was soon dropped until it was reintroduced officially for both men and women in the summer of 1972.

In the following podcast, Zoe Bull interviews Hannah Villines, ’21, about German handball.

After being introduced to German handball in eighth grade PE, Zeke Fuller, ‘20, opts to compete in the game one more time. Playing on team six, Fuller thinks they may have a chance to win.

“See, I think we’ve got a good chance,” Fuller said; “Everyone’s underestimating us. I think we’ve got a good shot. I just found a spot, so those people don’t even know I’m on their team. My main motivation was to join because I got to avoid being on the clean-up crew.”

Kirra Obwald, ‘23, joined team one last minute. She has almost no experience with the sport and plays it only during PE.

“I only heard about it for the first time in seventh grade,” Obwald said. “I’m looking forward to beating the other teams. We’ll have to see when we get there, but I think we have a 50-50 chance of beating the other teams. I was sitting in leadership minding my own business and someone asked me if I wanted to be on their team and I said sure, not knowing who else was on it.”

Don’t forget to visit the FC gym during lunch this week to cheer on the players and support German handball.

For more information on German handball, read German Handball: A Short History

For more articles, read Custodians: More than a clean up crew, World Kindness Day: Improve community goodwill, health, personal value, Nov. 13, and Central Valley residents battle air quality, resist climate change.

Zoe Bull can be reached via email and via Twitter.