Countywide : Pro Skaters Set Example for Students

Members of Anaheim’s professional roller hockey team put on a demonstration Monday for students at La Veta Elementary School in Orange on the importance of wearing safety equipment while skating or biking.

“I do want to tell you kids that if you skate or bike, wear protective gear,” said Stefan Desjardins, a player on the Anaheim Bullfrogs, which are scheduled to debut July 2 at Anaheim Arena. “Sometimes it doesn’t look so good, but you’ll be grateful when you fall.”

The 20-minute exhibition at the school was arranged by Jim Blee, hockey and promotions director of the Holiday Skating Center in Orange. Blee demonstrated such safety gear as helmets, wrist guards, elbow pads and kneepads to the assembled students.

“What happens when you fall? Your hands come out,” Blee said. “The most common injury at the Holiday Skating Center are kids breaking wrists.”

“Even the most professional skaters fall down,” he added.

When Blee asked the students how many of them wore safety equipment while skating, only a few raised their hands.

School administrators said they arranged the demonstration in hopes that more students would follow the example of the Bullfrogs in wearing safety gear.

“I think the Bullfrogs give them a model of someone professional in skating doing something safe and sane,” said Maggie Van Eck, La Veta’s principal. “Kids learn from what we do more than what we say. If a group of professionals in the skating business is wearing safety equipment, it sends a positive message.”

But while the students seemed to enjoy the skating demonstrations, their attitude toward safety equipment appeared to undergo little change.

“I just never got around to buying them,” said Jeff Tucker, 11. “They’re probably too expensive anyway.”

Other children who said they skate in full safety regalia say they wear the equipment more to appease their parents than out of a desire to be safe.

“My mom makes me wear everything but the helmet,” confided Ana Lauren Reiss, 11, a fifth-grader at the school who received a pair of skates for Christmas. “I don’t like to, they are really hot on me and fit tightly, but my mom said it was for my own good and not to come home to her if I get hurt not wearing them.”