New rugby programs are generally formed when one or more individuals organize them in a community, a school, or in cooperation with organizations like a Boy’s/Girl’s Club, etc. Less frequently, a school athletic department or an established rugby club agrees to sponsor a new team. For those interested in beginning a community-based club, USA Rugby supplies a Start Up Kit that will well suffice. For information, contact USA Rugby at info@usarugby.org or 719-637-1022.
Phil Bryant learned that success in establishing a high school rugby program required an entirely different approach. The high school model he developed in 1990-91 has been implemented by the Midwest RFU in the successful growth of its youth programs and was employed by the Tennessee High School League. The United States Rugby Football Foundation has been sufficiently impressed with the Bryant Model to publish an outline of it.
What follows below is a distillation of an expanded format of the model. It includes reasons to support his belief that employment of this model will assure that a high school program becomes a legacy rather than a memory when, inevitably, the initial organizers move on. It is a model that continues to evolve. Mr. Bryant encourages readers to forward him their experiences so as to expand the collective body of knowledge in the study.

Overview

Start a League – Midweek Play

If you are planning to start a high school age rugby program, be prepared to start a local league of at least four clubs in the first year. Unless there is already an established league in your area, never consider starting a single high school club. Second, schedule midweek matches, and limit a travel time of one hour from your target high school - in after-school traffic – to permit before dark play in the early spring.
Five considerations apply:
1. Kids will play rugby because it’s fun. Without enough competition, they will rapidly lose interest.
2. Most referee and coaching support is likely to be drawn from community club or college programs. Both of these entities have Saturday rugby obligations that could preclude their presence for weekend matches.
3. Should you schedule any weekend matches, do so in conjunction with the home matches of the coach’s own club. These matches will have referees on hand, who are otherwise in limited supply on weekends.
4. Parents and students are already familiar with weekday competition.
5. Midweek matches, on top of weekend matches, can potentially double the amount of competition in a high school season. High school rugby loses a week for spring break, ends early because of graduation and competes with proms and the mid-May US HS Championships.
Additionally, consider local climate and weather conditions, which vary widely across the US, in your schedule planning.

Arrange School Affiliation

Always affiliate with a high school to assure instant community recognition and identification for the student participants.
If your target is a public school, which is a community asset owned by the tax payers, then you as a taxpayer cannot legally be denied access to school activities and property as long as your requests are reasonable and do not interfere with other scheduled events.
If it is a private institution, you will not be denied the opportunity to start a rugby club if you rally the support of several of those who pay the bills. Once this is done parents of the students’ can meet with the school president or head master. In fact, a private school may provide varsity status with full school financial support.
School affiliation immediately guarantees the recognition of uniform colors, a team name and even a fight song. That alone is often enough to guarantee the long-term continuity of a school affiliated club should you move on. The institution, having so invested in the rugby club, may recruit a replacement coach to meet a market demand in younger siblings established after the recruitment of the first generation of players and parents.

Senior Club Affiliation

There can be an advantage to association with an existing senior rugby club, many of which sponsor high school clubs. Even if a local senior club does not currently exist, one might develop within a few years from the ranks of students originally introduced to the game in your program. Those who go on to play in college may form one when they ultimately return to the community. (In Indiana, the local union enjoyed a surge of growth in new college clubs three years after the start of its high school program. After ten years, the local union notes that new clubs are forming in communities with high school programs. The Indiana Rugby Union now reflects a pyramid organization structure with a wide youth base and a narrow adult club peak.)

Organize To Assure
League Success

Organize with league success in mind:
1. To protect your high school club from predatory recruiting practices, set league eligibility rules that require all students to play for their own high school, if that school has a rugby team. Students may play for other schools only until a club starts at their own. Some schools, however, may have rules that constrain play by outside students.
2. Encourage the traditional post-match interaction and conversation, to ease potentially disruptive cross-town rivalries. The home club should provide post-match drinks and snacks for the visitors, with each player presenting a cold drink to his visiting opposite.
3. Present awards: extra team T-shirts can be presented to the outstanding back and forward of the opponent’s team or to someone that their coach, who knows his kids, would like you to recognize for hard work in practice.
4. If time allows, plan a post match cookout for the teams with parent volunteers. Once a year, invite fans to the cookout on Fan Appreciation Day. This type of activity always attracts many player classmates.

State Tournament

Conclude the very first season with a State Tournament, even if the league of four teams is isolated and the only league in the state. State tournaments produce State Champions, which represent great public relations items for local media, especially if the story is accompanied with pictures. Ten years hence, no one will care that there were only four teams in the first state championship, only that their school won the tournament.
Select a large, significant trophy to serve for years as a conspicuous advertisement for rugby in the school trophy case.

Start At High School Level

While there may be resistance at the high school level in much of the US, do not be tempted to begin with pre-high school youth programs.
1. Experienced people are needed for high school programs as it is impossible to coach tackle rugby if you have never played it.
If the experienced people in your community are all committed to elementary, non-contact youth leagues, there may be no coaching assets left to start high schools programs later.
2. Any resistance to high school rugby will often stiffen, because now the opposition will see you coming.
3. With no high school program in place, the kids in the initial youth programs will have no high school program to advance to, and your work and limited resources will have been wasted. This is an oft-repeated error.
4. If coaches are available, it is possible to start a high school and youth program at the same time. If the youth league follows the high school season, some of the high school players will be available to coach the younger kids.
5. Once high school rugby is in place, it can be expanded into non-contact rugby. Coaching non-contact rugby does not require the prerequisite of contact rugby experience, and parents and physical education teachers can be taught.