JORDAN-CHRISTOPHER PURVIS
Staff Writer
Jerry Fisk has served as the athletic director for SUNY Fredonia for three years.
Some of his responsibilities involve managing the Athletic Department’s budget, coordinating athletic events, hiring and firing coaches and most importantly, discussing areas in which teams can improve.
Entering his fifth year working in college athletics, never in his wildest dreams did he expect the life of his and others to change so much due to a pandemic, which resulted in the deaths of 255,000 people in the U.S. alone.
In a Q+A with Fisk, he discussed how his job has changed due to COVID, students and community members potentially attending games next year, health and safety protocols and plans to support student athletes.
“Can you walk me through how you felt regarding Gov. Cuomo sending over 1.1 million kids home amid coronavirus?”
“When I had to tell teams in March that their seasons were over, and for some of them, their career was over, was one of the harder things I’ve done in my career. It was not something that I was excited about, but it was inevitable with the National Collegiate Athletic Association canceling championships. Just knowing that the health and safety of our student athletes and our staff are paramount, we didn’t know what was going on, but we knew it wasn’t safe for us to compete, travel and play other schools. Unfortunately, it was just a decision we had to make.”
“With sports resuming next semester, is there a possibility that students and community members can attend home games?”
“It’s a tough situation, but we’re doing all of the planning that we can. Look, my goal is for every student athlete to be able to play some meaningful games this year. It won’t look like normal. It won’t look like what it might’ve looked like in 2018, but if we can have some experience and get some competition, yes, students on campus can go to games, rally behind and have something to get excited about. I think that’d be great if we could do it.”
“Is there anything different about your job as a result of the coronavirus?”
“It’s almost a 180 [turn] for me and how I do things. I’m still planning for games, working with coaches and making sure that we’re doing what we need to when it comes to budgets — things like that. But instead of meeting with people and doing the job as it’s always been done, I now have a weekly conference call with my fellow SUNYAC athletic directors to plan, see how things are going on other campuses, touch base and support one another. We’ve been working on schedules, working on protocols and deciding what role athletics can and should play. Honestly, our first conference call was in April, and they went on all summer. Ten years from now, hopefully, this is a blip on the radar, and it was something we just had to work through and get there. It’s definitely changed a lot about the job, and I look forward to getting back to where it was before.”
“Across the NFL, we are witnessing a vast amount of athletes and coaching staffs test positive for COVID-19. If that occurs at Fredonia, what would happen next?”
“We have some protocols in place, but ultimately, as soon as there’s a positive test, we have to discontinue the pod that they’re in or the team they’re practicing with. We have to rely on our partners at LoGrasso Hall and the County Department of Health to help lead us through. At that point, it is not necessarily an athletic situation, it’s a public health situation. We would make sure that we are curtailing and isolating, that practices are canceled or modified somehow and rely on the experts. We understand that the priority right now has to be the public health, and it has to be the pandemic. If we get through the sport, that’s a real bonus.”