The New York Ski Educational Foundation is a non profit organization whose goal is to teach people to ski. The Foundation has severel disciplines, including ski jumping. At Whiteface mountian, there are alpine programs for all ages as well as a snowboard program for serious riders, and a freestyle skiing program as well. NYSEF also offers a cross country program which has branches of biathalon and nordic skiing. All of these programs are always looking for new recruits, but you'll have to go to their webpages for more information. I only have so much free time.

As far as the jumping program is concerned, Our head coach is Larry Stone, former U.S. ski team coach. Our current assistant coach is former 1998 Olympian, Casey Colby. We have a state of the art facility here in Lake Placid, with beginner hills, the K18 meter and the K48 meter jumps. For intermediate and advanced jumpers, we have year round training on the K90 meter hill, and several competitions a year, not to mention periodic training on the big 120 meter hill.

For more serious jumpers, NYSEF has a program coordinated with the National Sports Acedemy (NSA). For more information on the school or any of it's sports programs, visit the website at http://www.nationalsportsacedemy.com

We assure you or your parents that ski jumping is one of safer winter sports, with the exceptions being cross country skiing, figure skating, speed skating, and I guess if you really want to count curling. No jumping is allowed at any time without a qualified coach and first aid person on duty. All jumpers are required to wear helmets an on the bigger jumps protective suits with foam padding, as well as warm up and stretch before jumping. No jumper is allowed on a bigger jump until they have proven themselves stable and confident to handle it. Yes we have had inuries, and sometimes bad enough ones to put an end to a jumpers career, but those are thankfully few and far between.

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