Women’s HPER adds pool class

Transcription: Women’s HPER adds pool class

By Weldon Baird / IDS Staff Writer

Let’s not all rush over there, the women students are playing pool in the union. 

That’s right! Those females are at it again. Ladies are playing pocket billiards in the Billiards Room of the IMU. The idea of smokey “pool halls” and beating their boyfriends at the game is no longer a problem. 

The women are there for HPER classes which began this fall as a choice for the freshman physical education requirement. 

Women Adept as Men.

There’s no reason why women can’t be as adept as men in playing billiards, said Jean Pyfer, a teaching associate in the Department of Physical Education for Women, instructor for the course. 

Women, usually less aggressive than men, are more capable of a smooth stroke and accuracy in the ball placement. Miss Pyfer said. This may explain why some women here are belittling their male friends when scoring time arrives. 

Billiards courses, like all physical education courses, extend one-half of the semester, or eight weeks. To show how popular the course has been, all classes have been filled and 40 of the 60 women who took the beginning course the first eight weeks have enrolled in the intermediate course the second eight weeks.

Miss Pyfer also said the number of classes has doubled in the second eight weeks from three to six classes.

One woman student, after failing to get a ball in the pocket, said, “Now I know why pool halls are known for their language.” 

The billiards classes here may do much in changing the attitude towards billiards rooms from the dark, “smokey pool halls of yesteryear” to family recreation centers, Miss Pyfer said. 

Overwhelming response.

The IMU activities office suggested the billiards course to the Department of Health, Physical Education, and Recreation as a pilot study. Because of its over-whelming response the course will now be included in the curriculum, said Miss Pyfer. 

Like all sports, pocket billiards will have its “olympics” for student players from Indiana and Illinois colleges and universities. One man and one woman will represent I.U. at a tournament to be Feb. 14 and 15 at Northern Illinois University. Miss Pyfer said the woman representative will be from her class. 

“It’s going to be one of us here!” she told her class of female pool sharks.