One challenge is purely the number of females who have been involved in the game earlier in their lives. Most don't have the experience. What I saw in hockey was that a lot of them had played the game but were a little hesitant to coach or officiate, but then they did come out, whereas with football, we have very few females who grew up with the sport. That's the biggest challenge.
The second one is...just the number of female facilitators would be another challenge. We now have a group of females. Our first world championship was in 2010, and that has helped significantly in the growth of football in Saskatchewan. Now we have a group of females who we're dedicating time to getting them trained and on the sidelines, as well as in the classroom, and encouraging younger females to participate.
I think the biggest challenge with us is purely that they don't have the history of being on the field, or anywhere involved in the sport, other than probably watching the game on TV with their dad.
Going back to your first question, I think in football we have an opportunity on the female side, because although females do quit at the age of 13, at the same time, a lot of them participate for social reasons. If their friends are doing it, they might do it, and if they were not allowed to play when they were younger, especially male-dominated sports because their parents didn't encourage them or there wasn't the opportunity, they probably have a little more say in what they can do when they get to 13 or 14 years of age.
Football is a huge program in high schools. Students want to be involved in their sports programs, so if we can get female programming on flag football in the high schools, I think there would be an increase in participation, especially by that 13-year-old through 16-year-old age group. This is what we see in Saskatchewan, and what we see starting in Manitoba. B.C. is also starting with the same program, and Nova Scotia is looking into it. It allows them to be a part of the school program and be with their friends, and participate in a sport that they might have always wanted to from a distance, but didn't have the opportunity.