The beginning of a new school year brings many changes—one of those changes for Goshen College is the creation of stadium seating at the GC soccer complex.
According to GC athletic director Josh Gleason, the goal is to generate interest that could help to make some improvements and upgrades and be able to use the money brought in for those purposes.Gleason gave some insight into what brought about the update to the soccer complex. “In a very general sense, we’re looking at ways to improve all our facilities from playing surface to the aesthetics and making them visually appealing. It seemed this was a way to upgrade seating without major renovations and the pieces came together and it made sense.”
While there are only eight seats currently installed, the plan is to add more. “The eight installed now are kind of a preview. We have the capability to add up to 100 pretty easily but don’t anticipate doing that until down the line. We’re looking at around 50 right now,” said Gleason.
In order for seats to be reserved, the interested party must contact Gleason to reserve seats. Once the seats are reserved, the individuals have the right to that seat for as long as they want. Gleason elaborated on this, saying “The idea would be that the first year is purchasing the location, that seat, and there would be a smaller renewal fee yearly after that, that comes with the season pass.”
There are no current plans to add stadium seating to any other athletic facility as of now, with the soccer complex being a test-run. “We’re still waiting to see how it goes and waiting to see the response before moving forward in a similar fashion with our other venues” Gleason said.
With more seats expected in the next few weeks, the staff is interested to see how they are used by the community.
