Home- College of Education Faculty Oral Histories
- Mr. Bob Grindey
College of Education Faculty Oral Histories
Mr. Bob Grindey
LB: I wanted to ask you about the required program. It shifted to an elective physical education program, and I know at the time I was concerned about how the program would do. What do you remember about how that worked out?
BG: Well, the program was very popular because it was basically a physical fitness program. It wasn’t so much oriented towards sports skills as it was to being fit and living a healthy life. So when it became an elective program, we started branching off and giving instruction in golf, tennis, scuba diving, and things of that nature. Then students got really interested. We offered classes on different types of dance. We offered some team sports such as volleyball, soccer, and basketball. Students also could enroll in golf, tennis, or badminton. We even had classes in self-defense skills. We had people from the campus security teach self-defense skills. I think that was part of the success of that program. Not that those student didn’t get fitness, because in many of the courses they still focused on fitness. There were courses such as weight training and aerobic dance specifically for fitness. Students had an opportunity to learn all sorts of skills, everything from types of dancing to individual sports skills to team sports. I think that this is what made the elective physical education courses very popular.
LB: You at some point became coordinator of that program, and as you said it became quite popular and enrollment increased. At what point did we start hiring adjunct professors in some of these specialty areas?
BG: Well, yes we did have some adjuncts early, but not in a lot of the courses. But as the courses became more popular, and we had different types of courses and we needed people with specific skills. We would have to go out and find people who were interested in teaching on a very limited basis on campus and for not a great deal of money. Mostly people who were really interested in the activity they were teaching, and they were interested in giving those types of skills to other people.
LB: I remember you built up that elective program in 1984 and in 1985, and it was moved into the College of Education, perhaps a little earlier than that, and it eventually merged with the Professional Physical Education Program. BG: Correct.
LB: It became one program. I was wondering if you experienced any adjustments with that change.
BG: Well, I didn’t have any problems with that because we worked so closely with the faculty in the other program for many years. We knew them personally, and it was a lot easier than if we were going into a new department, or merging, let’s say with a department across campus where they were basically strangers.
LB: Among your teaching, coaching, and administrative contributions, which have been many here at USF, which of those are you most proud of? You might want to take some time to think about those.
BG: Well, of course I have always been proud of our swim team, especially in a state like Florida where swimming was very well developed in the larger universities such as the University of Miami, University of Florida, and Florida State University. When we were starting, as a matter of fact, those were the only three schools that had swim teams. For us to keep our head above water and compete against Southeastern Conference schools, I was very proud of our swimmers. I was also very proud of the scuba program. Not only were we the first, we were the biggest. I think probably in the years that I was involved we taught somewhere over 5,000 people how to scuba dive safely. I was always proud of that. However, I think probably the thing that I worked the hardest at, and with your help, we developed a course about the place of sports in society. More specifically, how sports has helped to mold our society, our interests, and even our ethics. I think that having that course being accepted as one of the courses that students might take as a graduation exit requirement was probably my greatest pride.
LB: It continues to be a good and popular course. I wondered if you have any particular stories, memories, maybe even humorous ones that you can share with us from anywhere along the way, from either athletics or from teaching?
BG: Well, in the early days of athletics, almost everything was a humorous moment. We had a young athletic council, and many of them really didn’t know much about athletics. They determined that the school’s physician from the Student Health Center would be the deciding factor on whether students were physically ready to participate in intercollegiate athletics. He was commissioned to set up a check list of the things that people ought to be able to physically do before they were allowed to compete in varsity athletics. He came into our athletic council meeting in the fall, and they were thinking about playing some intercollegiate soccer with some of the junior colleges around the state because the universities hadn’t picked up soccer yet. When he read his list, I remember the soccer coach getting up and he said, “Doc, if you set up those requirements there wouldn’t be a student in school that could do it.” He obviously, being a physician from the health center, couldn’t grasp what was needed for intercollegiate athletics. Who was chair of the Athletic Council then I cannot remember his name.
LB: Dr. Stanton?