Making a mark: A look into NGU’s Marksmanship club
Photo courtesy of Michael Weaver
Samantha Meyeres, Staff Writer
In order to encourage students to pursue their passions and interests, North Greenville University is home to over 20 clubs and organizations. For those whose interest lies in target shooting, the marksmanship club may be just what they’re looking for.
While NGU does not have an official marksmanship team, there was enough interest among students to begin a club. The club practices at Sharpshooters Indoor Range in Greenville, shooting .22 pistols at indoor targets. They participated in and won the SC State Championship shooting competition last spring.
Music professor Michael Weaver is the coach and adviser for the club. He helps those involved to develop their shooting skills as well as organizes club events and training. He served for 10 years in the Marines and is a certified National Rifle Association (NRA) instructor.
Weaver’s friend Vic Seiter, an employee at Sharpshooters as well as the coach of the Greenville Hurricanes Marksmanship team prompted Weaver to start a shooting team at NGU. He said this because many of his high schoolers were Christians looking for a college to attend. Seiter believed that if there was a way for them to continue doing the sport they loved in college, they would likely consider attending NGU.
Although there are around 20 members on the club roster, only a handful of them are consistent attendees of marksmanship practices. Junior biology major Evelyn Roderer is the student president of the club. She has been shooting since her dad taught her at 11 years old and joined her first marksmanship team in her junior year of high school.
As president, Roderer’s job is to time people during practices and work with members on their technique and accuracy. She hopes that the marksmanship club will help those involved to develop “knowledge and experience to safely and responsibly handle firearms.”
Since the club is relatively new, they are focusing on accuracy right now, but once that is mastered, it is speed that counts in competitions. Marksmanship is a team sport and competitions consist of teams of four.
The competition takes place in four stages with each person getting five timed runs per stage. The judges take the participant’s fastest time from each stage to get their personal score. After that, all of the team’s scores are added together to get the squad score. The fastest squad score wins the competition.
Both Weaver and Roderer shared how they hope that in the future, marksmanship will become a team sport at NGU. This would mean that members wouldn’t need to provide their own equipment or ammunition, and the university would handle the competition fees. Having an official team would also mean that there would be scholarships available for participants.
Until then, the members will continue to develop their speed, accuracy and learn the importance of hard work and perseverance in the process.
