Baseball & Softball
North Carolina Pride Summer 2010 Australia Tour
Applications are now open for the North Carolina (NC) Pride U/16 & U/18 years Summer Australia Baseball & Softball Team Tours to be conducted August 4 – 20, 2010. The Sports Travel Academy, based in Cary, NC organizes global sports team travel as well as faculty led study abroad programs for university and college students in Sport Management, Sport Business, Sport Medicine & Athletic Training.
We are pleased to announce Mr. Jon Mitchell as the Director for Team Development and the Head Coach for the Baseball Program and our Head Coach for the Softball program is still open. Our coaches and staff have excellent résumés and a proven track record of managing quality programs and providing both a fun but also a competitive environment for youth athlete development. In addition to the Pride’s Coaching Staff, Mr. Craig Douglass from the Sports Travel Academy who is an Australian living in Cary, NC will also be traveling with the group as their tour guide. Craig has personally led over 70 international tour groups and his travel experience on the ground will nicely compliment Coach Mitchell’s expertise on the ball field.
As the emphasis on global awareness has increased in recent years so too has the popularity of international student sports travel programs. Australia is a very safe destination with wonderful hospitality, and many Australian clubs are very much interested in hosting American sports travel groups. The NC Pride team tours are designed to be more than just an athletic experience. Instead we are using baseball as a wonderful medium to achieve so much more!! Our program provides fantastic opportunities for students to enjoy the vast benefits of international travel, athletic competition and cultural exchange. Our aim is to provide a medium to achieve a broader more enlightened perspective of the world while fostering the chance to create lifelong friendships within their own local team as well as with the Aussie students that they will encounter and home stay with along the way.
The tour includes 7 – 9 games, a great deal of sightseeing opportunities as well as a visit to an Australian high school, where students will be involved in attending classes and various other school activities. Players will also home stay with three selected Australian families for two nights each therefore providing an excellent balance between spending time with their USA teammates and immersing themselves into the Aussie culture. There are also several on-tour educational components as highlighted in the tour itinerary. The weekend prior to departure the team will meet for a pre-departure camp and there will also be an evening presentation prior to departure which will cover Australian History & Culture, packing requirements as well as a slide show and Q & A session.
And yes, Parents & other team supporters are welcome to attend!! In an effort to accommodate both groups, there will be some differences in the itineraries to help cater to both individual and family/group dynamics. We want the players to have space away from parents and the opportunity to bond as a unit, experience Australian life through home stays and cultivate their own memories. Simultaneously, we want the parents/supporters to enjoy their own opportunities with time to explore their interests apart from the team. We strive to establish a good balance between group activities as a whole, and individual interests which can make a good trip a truly memorable experience. To help us achieve this goal we have prepared two separate travel packages & itineraries.
