VERO BEACH, Fla. – Josh Navarro spends time paddling at Vero Beach, but there is something heavy on his mind.
“Moving from university to a club is really destructive, and I’m smart at work and I got a very old shift just thinking about it, and I’m crushed,” Navarro told WPTV on Thursday. “Like I said, this sport became my life.”
Its university, Florida Institute of Technology, decided to release five varsity sports programs to club status, including men’s paddle, women’s paddle, cross country/men’s track distance, women’s cross country/track distance and men’s golf.
“What makes me decide on FIT is the fact that they have a good rowing team,” Navarro said. “They got a good coach, a good group of men.”
He stated that the move will not only mean his team will no longer compete at the NCAA level, but will also affect recruitment, funding, scholarships and travel.
“It happened in the middle of the summer,” Navarro said. “School applications are closed, rosters fill the rowing team, it becomes very difficult to move out. I want to be able to line up at the varsity level. I want to be able to have that. I want all my teams to have that. I want all the other athletes on other teams to have that. “
Navarro said he plans to stay at FIT and the school will continue to honor his scholarship.
But he is afraid of what it means for the program to progress.
“For people who will come into this sport coming from Florida and want to stay local, it’s no longer – FIT no longer – an option for those students, who are quite competitive in high school and want to continue,” her mother, Gina. Navarro, told WPTV. “They’ll go to a northeast school. They won’t live in Florida.”
FIT said the decision was to focus on 11 other competitive sports and provide them with more resources.
“We’re as competitive as we are, I think we’re the oldest sport in school – men’s rowing – so I think for them to jump and make this decision is just a bad decision and a rush,” Josh Navarro said.
There is now a petition on Change.org to restore the program. It got a goal of 7,500 signatures.
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