Sports Column

Nice stories lost in the shuffle

Fair Game

By kerry eggers

The Portland Tribune, Jul 10, 2007, Updated Oct 30, 2009 (6 Reader comments)

In the hustle and bustle of sports reporting, sometimes nice stories get overlooked.

Such as a disadvantaged Reynolds High freshman earning a national golf honor and an expenses-paid trip to Philadelphia for an awards banquet.

Or two Portland-area golf courses continuing a tradition to offer instruction to women at very low cost.

Or even a much-maligned Trail Blazer covering funeral expenses for a boy who died in an accident.

To wit:

• Gresham’s Sarah Wood hasn’t had it easy in her young life. Sarah and her single mother, Sharon, have narrowly avoided homelessness and live with public assistance, but that hasn’t stopped 15-year-old Sarah from making something of her life.

After being introduced to golf by the First Tee program of the Children’s Course in Gladstone at age 10, Wood took to the game. As a freshman at Reynolds, she played No. 3 or No. 4 on the golf team this spring.

An honor-roll student with a 3.6 GPA who also was captain of the freshman basketball team, she has volunteered to work with 4-, 5- and 6-year-olds the past three summers as part of the Discovery Golf program through the Children’s Course.

Wood has been selected as one of 14 regional semifinalists for the Royal Bank of Scotland Achiever of the Year award and earned a $1,000 college scholarship. Wood and her mother will be in Philadelphia Aug. 9 through Aug. 12 for the RBS banquet, and she is in line for a $10,000 scholarship.

“Sarah is a great kid,” says Dennis Schrag, executive director of the Children’s Course. “She was extremely shy and quiet when she started with us five years ago, but she is now is one of our key speakers at three fundraising events.”

The Children’s Course, a nine-hole three-par layout, is a nonprofit organization dedicated to teaching special-needs youths life skills along with golf. Only 20 percent of its funding comes from greens fees and course income; the rest is provided through private donations.

“I owe a lot” to the Children’s Course, Wood says. “I really like First Tee. It teaches life skills, helps you set goals and then achieve them. It got me on the honor roll.

“I’m very excited to get to go to Philadelphia and have a chance at a $10,000 scholarship. The farthest I’ve been away from home is Southern California, so it’s a little scary. But with my mom going, it’s OK.”

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