If you’re here for the Crossword Puzzle answers from last week’s blog scroll to the bottom of the blog.
There’s a lot of things that I’m proud about for Sabattus Disc Golf. Keeping courses immaculate, a well stocked pro shop, a nice clean bathroom, and providing a fun experience for golfers of all skill levels.
But one of the things that I think we do exceptionally well is giving back to the community.
A couple years ago we had hundreds of lost and found discs down in our basement and we didn’t know what to do with them. We’d run out of space on our racks upstairs and boxed them away. I call, email, and Facebook message people to come get their discs, but we still end up with hundreds at the end of the year.
We’d donated used discs in the past, when people approached us about them. But now we are starting to develop a problem. With the increase in the number of people playing disc golf, our number of lost discs was increasing as well.
It’s May 16th (when I write this) and I’ve already got 201 discs sitting on our Lost and Found racks!
My mom was a former physical education teacher and so I know that PE budgets aren’t overflowing. Giving discs to schools seemed like a great idea. We all know that a good premium disc costs about 17 dollars. At 20 discs for a class that’s 340 dollars they could be spending elsewhere in their budget.
After attending UMF I’d developed a good network of teacher friends. I was able to reach out to some of them and this was our donation in 2020 where lots of discs went to 5 schools. We’d donated some previously in 2019, twice in fact! I lost the 2021 donation numbers sheet, but we gave our discs to Team Innova member Hannah Leatherman as she brought discs to Africa. It was at least 3 boxes, so I estimate probably 300-400 discs. Leatherman previously helped install a course and brought this sport to the world.
So in 2021 I reached out to the Maine Disc Golf Scene, Maine’s largest disc golf group, to see who would be willing to help us out and take discs to local schools.
18 different schools and organizations reached out. We were able to divide the 324 lost discs into boxes of 13-24 discs according to what the schools/organizations could use.
These are the organizations that received discs from us in 2022.
Penquis Valley Disc Golf Club
MSAD 75
Bowdoinham/Bowdoin Elementary
Sanford High School
Reed Brooks Middle School
Geiger Element
Vassalboro High School
Palermo Middle School
Casco Bay YMCA
Medomak Valley Middle School
Skowhegan Schools
Bath Middle School
Momentum Community Support
Macarthur Library Biddeford
Ellsworth High School
Thank you to every single person who returns a disc to the pro shop. You’re the reason why in the years I’ve been working here we’ve been able to donate over a thousand discs to kids all over Maine, and around the world! I can’t say enough nice things about you folks who turn in plastic.
Every time you return a disc to the pro shop you can be happy knowing that it’s going back to its rightful owner, or a kid is going to be chucking it during their phys ed class. Or when I go volunteer at a local school.
If you know of a school or organization in Maine who could use some free discs I’ll be making another post about it in the Fall/Winter.
We’re proud to be a small business in the Maine community that offers what we can to those around us. Thank you for supporting us.
May your discs miss all the trees,
Andrew Streeter #70397
