Aaryon Vaughn, BRTC Trap and Skeet Club Member
POCAHONTAS, AR April 25— Black River Technical College is excited to announce that it has started a Trap and Skeet Club. The club will feature both male and female competitive shooters from the surrounding areas.
The Trap and Skeet Club, along with Esports and Flag Football, has been added to the student activities now offered at BRTC. The college decided to add the Trap and Skeet Club after recognizing that Trapshooting is a growing sport in the state of Arkansas at the secondary school level. Specifically, Northeast Arkansas secondary students have embraced the sport with teams at Westside, Walnut Ridge, Sloan-Hendrix, Greene County Tech, Marmaduke, Rector, and Corning, just to name a few. These teams consistently produce some of the state and nation’s top trap and skeet shooters. Most recently, the college-aged shooters from Corning, Arkansas, placed 3rd in the Grand American World Trapshooting Championship in Sparta, Illinois, in the summer of 2021. Two of the five shooters on the team were current BRTC students.
In addition to a growing talent base and rich tradition of shooting sports in the BRTC service area, BRTC took note that several top-notch shooting sports facilities have or are currently being built in Northeast Arkansas. Corning, Arkansas, is home to one of the state’s top privately-owned trap and skeet shooting facilities, The Black River Trap and Skeet Club. Also, the city of Jonesboro recently completed a $8.35 million dollar shooting sports complex, which will only further solidify Northeast Arkansas as one of the nations’ premier shooting sports areas. Lastly, the City of Pocahontas has begun work on a city-owned trap and skeet facility that will serve as a home facility for the BRTC competition trap and skeet club team.
Furthermore, BRTC has heavily committed academically to the shooting and gun industry by establishing the highly popular and successful gunsmithing program. A successful and potentially championship-caliber nationally recognized trapshooting team will only further BRTC’s pursuit of being named an “Arkansas Center of Excellence,” which is an Arkansas Economic Development Commission initiative that recognizes and strengthens the partnerships between colleges and industry. Likewise, BRTC is currently in the beginning phases of seeking NRA recognition as the nation’s 5th NRA-approved gunsmithing school. BRTC will strengthen its competitive position for these two academically prestigious recognitions with an all-inclusive approach that includes a potentially nationally recognized student-life shooting sports program.
The BRTC Trap and Skeet Club will also offer several opportunities for current students and instructors of various programs to support the initiative, further integrating the blending of academics and student life in this endeavor. Some potential partnerships include utilizing BRTC’s Law Enforcement Training Academy instructors for gun range safety supervision and gun safety protocol development. Gun safety activities are already part of the BRTC LETA program, which has many years of experience operating guns in a range setting with college students. Second, the opportunity for the current gunsmithing program to help maintain and modify trap shooting firearms is second to none.
No other collegiate trapshooting program in the nation has such a robust support system to equip, maintain, and provide safety for firearms and range usage, along with a nationally recognized and experienced talent base within its service area to draw upon for future Black Hawk Trap and Skeet Club members.
Jason Smith, J.D. Vice President of Students Affairs, states, “On behalf of the BRTC administration, I want to thank community members Jim Clifton and Michael Smith of the Black River Trap and Skeet Club in Corning, Arkansas, for their guidance in the creation of the BRTC Trap and Skeet Club, along with the usage of the Black River Trap and Skeet Club in Corning for BRTC team practices. I also want to thank Pocahontas Mayor Keith Sutton and BRTC Foundation board member Danny Barr for their support in the creation of the BRTC Trap and Skeet Club along with the design and creation of the future Pocahontas Shooting Sports Complex, which will permanently serve as the Black Hawk Trap and Skeet Club home facility.”
Smith adds, “We believe this new and exciting blend of academics, community tradition, and a rich talent base will solidify BRTC as one of the nation’s premier trap and skeet shooting collegiate programs.”
Students interested in joining the Trap and Skeet Club should contact Neal Harwell, Director of Student Development, by phone at (870) 248-4000, ext. 4158 or by email at neal.harwell@blackrivertech.edu. For more information about BRTC, visit https://blackrivertech.org/.