User:Jslax

Liberty High School Lacrosse, Bethlehem, Pennsylvania
The Liberty Girls Lacrosse Club was founded in 2004 by Joe Sexton, along with 12 interested girls led by student Yvonne Baker. This became a school-sanctioned club, but was financially and administratively independent from the school until spring of 2015. By following PIAA rules and regulations, the club was eligible for district and state playoffs. The girls played a regular varsity and junior varsity schedule since 2004. The club has won two Lehigh Valley Invitational Championships; the Junior Varsity championship in 2004 and the Varsity championship in 2008. Over 13 girls have gone on to play lacrosse in college since the club's inception. In 2009, the club's administration was forced to create and receive approval from the present Bethlehem Area School District for a new Club Sports policy. This allowed lacrosse and any other future club sports in the district to compete on the same level as other fully funded school varsity sports in Pennsylvania. The Liberty Boys Lacrosse Club was then started in 2012, also by Coach Sexton, and also functioned under the Club Sports policy. Both clubs were initially sponsored by the Lehigh Valley Conference, and now are part of the newly created East Penn conference. The other high school in the district, Freedom, also started both a boys and girls club in 2011. Despite recurrent attempts from 2004-2013, the Bethlehem Area school district, along with lack of support from the previous school athletic administration, continued to refuse to take lacrosse into their budgets. It has become one of the most popular sports at Liberty high school. Finally, the board approved for lacrosse to be part of the district's formal athletic program in 2014 for the 2015 season. Both Liberty and Freedom high schools now have full boys and girls' varsity and junior varsity teams.