Golf opportunities for Myrtle Beach area youth should improve with new organization

The First Tee of the Grand Strand, a youth development organization that utilizes the game of golf as a vehicle, already reaches close to 800 children in Horry and Georgetown counties with direct programming and about 12,000 more through elementary school physical education classes.

Leaders of the organization believe they will be able to impact even more kids, and reach them more effectively, through a pending consolidation with two other First Tee chapters in eastern and southeastern North Carolina.

All are currently under the direction of The Carol S. Petrea Youth Golf Foundation as a parent organization, but are operated largely independently.

They are coming together to form the singular The First Tee of the Coastal Carolinas through a foundation initiative dubbed “Drive the Future,” with the consolidation expected to be completed by Jan. 1.

The other chapters are The First Tees of Brunswick County and Eastern North Carolina, which includes Carteret, Craven and Pamlico counties to the north of Wilmington.

Lindell Bradley, board chair of the Petrea Foundation, said the consolidation will strengthen the collective chapters by creating more financial efficiencies; enabling the increased use of shared resources such as technology, purchasing, marketing and human resources; and bringing consistency to programming.

“We have always been connected to the foundation but the programs in this area are now more supported,” First Tee of the Grand Strand executive director Rich Abraham said. “I think always being part of a larger organization is great. You have resources a larger organization can own.”

Bradley said the foundation has had to supplement Grand Strand chapter fundraising in recent years and believes the Horry and Georgetown county areas will be better funded under the new plan. And it will be targeted.

“The biggest growth opportunity we have right now is in the Horry County area,” Bradley said. “It has the largest population. We know there is a potential of reaching over 90,000 young people [combined].”

The area First Tee has also recently been boosted by increased support in recent months from marketing cooperative Myrtle Beach Golf Holiday, which launched a Project Golf initiative that targets youth golf projects.

Though some paid positions among the three currently separate First Tee chapters are being eliminated to make the new organization more efficient, Abraham has been named the acting executive director for the Coastal Carolinas chapter and programs director Patrick O’Brien will retain a position.

The First Tee of the Grand Strand instructs about 150 children in its fall after-school/Saturday programs and about 650 fourth-graders through its off-campus school-day program in Georgetown County. Additionally, about 12,300 are reached by the national school program in PE classes in Horry and Georgetown counties.

The First Tee stresses nine core values to develop youth in addition to its golf programming. The Coastal Carolinas chapter will be headquartered at The Golf Club at Cinghiale Creek in Shallotte, N.C., which includes a Tom Watson-designed Par 3 Learning Course, driving range, three-hole loop and the Carolinas Leadership Academy, which hosts summer camps.

First Tee students in Horry and Georgetown counties will have access to First Tee coaching for a longer period since O’Brien recently increased his coaching level and Terry Mauney, the program director for the entire First Tee of the Coastal Carolinas, has the highest level of training.

“Obviously we want to keep teens in the program, and that allows us to do that,” Abraham said.

The First Tee was introduced to Myrtle Beach in 2005 as an independent chapter but it struggled to survive and was taken in by the Petrea Foundation in 2012, changing its name from The First Tee of Myrtle Beach to The First Tee of the Grand Strand.

“The Coastal Carolinas is one of the fastest growing regions in the U.S. and we believe the opportunity to reach more young people with the benefits that The First Tee organization provides is significant and critical,” Bradley said.

This story was originally published October 30, 2017 at 9:32 PM with the headline "Golf opportunities for Myrtle Beach area youth should improve with new organization."