| There are few ways of teaching the meaning of responsibility, respect, honesty, and loyalty quite like sport. The Woodberry Forest athletic program provides opportunity for students to compete on a wide variety of teams at all levels. Showing up to practice every day, playing your hardest because you owe it to yourself and teammates, fair play, sportsmanship, and dedication… Values learned through competition translate easily into the ideals that Woodberry Forest School seeks to develop. The discipline, teamwork, and respect that athletes attain through competition in high school are a superb foundation for the lessons of college and life. Participation in athletics is the opportunity for the student to develop interpersonal and physical skills.
Attributes of a good human being can be taught in a classroom, but it is on the playing fields where they are practiced. Experiences that allow students to understand other people’s feelings occur when they are able to compete and perform with others. They learn socialization skills like sharing ideas, trusting, problem solving, accepting criticism and emotional control. They are provided valuable lessons in the nature of success and failure and hard work. Admissions to the most selective colleges reflect this; a majority of students accepted at these institutions have competed on the varsity level in high school.
Participation in Woodberry Forest athletics is inherently educational for all. Activities are logically linked to the objectives of the over-all educational program. Their primary purpose is to meet the school related interests and needs of students that are not provided sufficiently by the curricular program. And the key word is the word ALL—not just the active and talented students. Woodberry Forest School participation levels vary, but usually 90% of the student body participates each season compared to 50% yearly in today’s average high school.
Woodberry Forest School seeks to produce well rounded graduates, renaissance men, ready to assume the highest responsibilities of citizenship in our community. A demanding academic program goes a long way towards that goal. So does a demanding challenging athletic program. Woodberry Forest athletes get the best of both worlds.
Woodberry Forest School offers 13 interscholastic athletic programs and 38 teams, one of the largest offerings of any school. Such a wide variety provides a wonderful opportunity for our students to represent their school and to gain the benefits of participation. None of our teams are made up of recruited athletes and all provide everyone the opportunity to compete. Some of our teams compete on the highest levels of competition while others struggle from contest to contest. All are treated equally and are respected for their effort. We represent what Theodore Roosevelt meant when he said,
“It is not the critic who counts, not the one who points out how the strongman stumbled or how the doer of deeds might have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred with sweat and dust and blood; who strives valiantly, who errs and comes short again and again, who know the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, and spends himself in a worthy cause; who if he wins, knows the triumph of high achievement; and who, if fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory or defeat.”
Woodberry Forest student athletes compete at the highest level academically and athletically.
To support our athletes Woodberry Forest has one of the finest prep school athletic complexes in the nation. We have recently constructed 2 synthetic fields, Johnson Stadium for football and lacrosse, a 9 court climate controlled squash pavilion, and 8 lane NCAA quality track and Bermuda grass field.
These additions complement our already strong facilities. The Harry Barbee Jr. Center houses an outstanding 200 meter indoor track, 3 basketball courts, a racquet ball court, three additional squash courts, and a six lane swimming pool with diving board. A majority of our basketball games are held in Dick Gymnasium, a historic building, which is one of the most exciting venues in the mid-atlantic states. Attached to the gymnasium is Reily Wrestling Center with 2 full mats and The Glover Center which houses an outstanding fitness facility. Woodberry also has a regulation nine hole Donald Ross designed golf course, 7 additional full size fields, 2 baseball fields, 14 tennis courts, an outdoor pool, and cross country courses which annually host the state meet. |