I to want to encourage you to "not give up the fight." When my daughter was in High School, some schools had teams as a club but not her high school they were very academic (the football team never won a game). So when she decided to start a team she received alot of opposition, but she didn't give up. In her sophomore year she managed to get them to allow the team as a club as long as they had an adult advisor that had to clear the school board as a substute teach and was wiling go to all of the matches each week about 15 weeks, but she found someone and they had a team for 3 years. She was top bowler for the all 3 years and went on to receive a scholarship to bowl for the University of Nebraska - Linclon and has 3 national titles out of the 4 years she bowled.
So don't give up the fight to get the school to let you have a team or to reconize the members for High School, Female bowler have many oportunities to get there advanced education to be paid, also if you are a female with at least a 180+ average and want to bowl for college, first look at www.SUbowling.com and go to "join the team page" and fill out the info. Then, if you are not interested their you can go to NCAA.org to get a list of other schools.
There are some club teams that offer some scholarship money but they are very few and usually you have to try out for them before you get it.

It does take a lot of work. I put in over 500 hours annually to the High School team including a lot of travel time. I spend at least a week at the coaches summit where ever it may be every year. The students and their parents also do a lot of work. Lobbying the school district, talking to newpapers etc. Fundraising also is a big thing. Bowling is not free in Texas! at least for most schools. Like Coach439 has stated keep working at it. All our schools seniors on the bowling club have been excepted to colleges and we are still looking for more schools.

Smash49

Ugh, I would've loved so much if my HS recognized a bowling team.

Wow, I love that game so much!

I guess, I was fortunate. I received a Varsity letter for each of the 4 years of HS Bowling. But, it took a dedicated teacher in the school to be the moderator and keep it going. Don't even know if he could bowl. His problem was to get budget to pay for school bus and bowling. Another problem was the overlap with other Fall sports of Football and Basketball. Kids had to choose between them. Some exceptions were made because the Moderator was able to schedule bowling meets on Friday, late after school. This was a normally slow Football practice, since our games were usually on Sat at noon. I bowled, and played FB.

I was fortunate enough to live in a state where bowling is a recognized Varsity sport (New York). I bowled all 6 years I was in Junior and Senior High School and my team won the Boys' State Championship in 1992. To me, high school bowling is like a college bowling atmosphere in that it's enthusiastic and a great learning experience if you want to continue competing at a very high level. As a matter of fact, if it weren't for school bowling, I wouldn't have some of the friends I have now.

For those of you who don't have it, keep working at it. Bowling, in the youth levels, is showing a resurrection of sorts, and may arrive near the level of popularity it once held with adults back in the "heydays" of the 50's through 70's. I've said it many times before, both as a youth bowler, as an adult bowler, and now as a coach - kids are the future of any sport and we need to give them any and every opportunity to succeed and enjoy the sport that we possibly can. Without youth participation, this sport will continue to decline where only diehards remain.

Lindzee

In the small town(Lindsay, Okla.) where I grew up there was no bowling team at all for students. Varsity or otherwise and certainly no club. My suggestion would be to contact the school board for one and discuss this at an open meeting but you will most likely have to have other kids interested in it other than 1, 2, or 3 of you. Get your word out and keep it out. Originally I'm from Oklahoma where as DJ mentions it above that football is like a religion. Sadly it is that way in almost all cities...small, large, or metropolitan.

Since you are 17 and on your way to graduating HS and moving on to college....one thing the board may need to realize is that if the school does decide to recognize you then it might mean more scholarships for those in the future for students such as yourself. In this case you may end up being the "martyr" by your activism in getting recognition but if you don't continue to try and see it through....it certainly will not ever be recognized.

I'd also get in touch with collegiate coaches who may lend you a hand or even attend the meetings with you. There are always options so utilize anything and everything to see your accomplishments through. It will not be an easy journey and it will frustrate you to no end....but there is one thing I want to invoke in you.....one voice cannot change anything.....a multitude of voices can change everything. Find sponsosrs or whatever you need to do.....but if the school won't recognize and support you and you have to find outside sponsors to do it....then remind the school that whatever revenue you bring in to support your organization that they will certainly not reap the benefits that you bring in. Let them cut their own throats.

This [censored] happened at my school. Many people tried many times to get a team going and to get the area going competition and no one has interests in it. Its like they think bowling isnt a sport or isnt hard compared to other sports.

Here where bowling is very big now, one of the local schools demoted bowling from a team to a club this year. Boys and girls both made enough money, I think boys ended up 6th in state, girls 2nd.

I lettered in bowling my 4 years in high school as well, and in fact won the Section III team, doubles and singles tournaments at the end of the season my sophomore, junior and senior years respectively (I may be the only one to have done that, I'm not sure though). My school recognizes bowling as a varsity sport, and in fact almost every high school around here has a varsity and JV bowling team.

Lindzee your school may have a problem with thinking that it will have to shell out extra funding for the bowling teams. One of the schools near me (Oswego) had to disband their team because their local lanes burned down and the school couldn't afford it anymore.

As for the one high school administration thinking ice hockey is a disgrace to the school, that's just sad. He's probably a big football guy and anything that's not football doesn't matter to him. Actually that's kind of the way it is all over the country nowadays, though thankfully my area recognizes the importance and diversity of all sports from football to baseball to hockey to bowling to basketball.

New Jersey has been a good state for HS bowling too, but my HS was similar to others in how our team was treated, even though they had a team long before I got there. My Freshman year, we had no school provided transportation to the lanes that were 9 miles away, we had to get there ourselves. Next, for my Sophmore-Senior year we were given transportation to the lanes, but not back to home. During those 4 years we had a winning record every season, including winning our first county championship in my senior year. We went on to win our sectional that year too to go to states. That year, 2 of my teammates and I were named to the all-county team.

Even with success, we were still not treated the same as the other sports. We were supposed to get a championship banner in the gym to go along with the ones for all the other teams, but we never saw it and I'm not sure they ever got one for that year.

Mark