By: Madison Tamayo

Sports in high schools have evolved tremendously throughout the years, and at Redwood High School. The fight for new sports and equality is continuing everyday. 

Joshua Gilcrest, ’20, has been fighting to add a boys volleyball team for all four years that he has been at Redwood.  Gilcrest started playing volleyball when he was 11 with his siblings. When he was 13, he started playing competitively on a team in Fresno.

His oldest sister, Brooke Gilcrest, ’17, played volleyball all four years at Redwood and now plays at UC Davis. His younger sister, Mia Gilcrest, ’21, is currently on the Varsity team at Redwood and finished her junior season with 568 kills as an outside hitter.

Gilcrest says, “I have wanted a volleyball team at Redwood for a long time because I got to see first hand all the men’s teams in Fresno and how epic they were.” He has had many talks with Redwood’s athletic director, Matt Sozihno and has attended several district meetings to try to get a team for boys. 

At these meetings, Gilcrest has learned about a rule called Title 9. This means that there needs to be an equal amount of girl’s teams and boy’s teams. At Redwood, the numbers are currently equal. Gilcrest says that adding another girls team has been considered but no actions have been taken.

Many have asked, “why have girls tried out for football but boys are not allowed to try out for volleyball?” Redwood’s athletic director, Mr. Sozinho, says, “The volleyball net in the boys volleyball situation is taller.”

Sozinho continues by explaining that more VUSD high schools would need more interest in adding a boys volleyball team. Clovis Unified School District and more have boys’ volleyball tams within the schools such as Clovis North, Buchanan, and Clovis High but there are currently no boys teams in the Tulare County.

A compromise to this issue is the event of Buff Ball. Buff Ball is a fun, campus- wide tournament coached by girls where boys are allowed to play volleyball. More than 100 boys of all grade levels played in the tournament last year.

Another compromise is a club, newly formed this year, called Volley Club. This club is building and hopes to create tournaments and events where co-ed volleyball teams are allowed to compete.

Co-President of this club, Malia Priesendorf, ‘20, says, “The purpose of this club is to allow any student to play volleyball with their friends.” This club and other students are still working very hard to bring a new team to this school.

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