On Oct. 13, the State College Area School District (SCASD) School Board officially approved the motion to purchase a video board for use in the North Gymnasium. The video board, with a price tag totaling $148,950, was funded by a private donation from Larry M. Beans, a graduate of State High’s class of 1962.

Beans, who previously donated one million dollars to the Memorial Field project, made this donation with the specific intent of installing the video board, which will be used during basketball, volleyball, and wrestling events in the future.

Similar to the one funded by Beans at Memorial Field, the video board will include a panel acknowledging his generosity.

State High Athletic Director Loren Crispell commented on how meaningful Beans’s generosity is to the athletic program.

“We are very blessed to have alums with resources, and just as importantly, with motivation to help our district and our athletic department…and we’re very blessed to have Mr. Beans’s support. He was a huge part of this board being a possibility and coming to fruition,” Crispell said.

Junior varsity basketball player Charlie Carr commented on his initial reaction after hearing about the video board.

“I was excited, you know, I have never really been in an atmosphere with [a video board] much, so it’s gonna be different for sure,” Carr said. 

The current intended timetable for the board’s physical installation is between the winter and spring sports seasons. The exact dates, however, are not set in stone, due to the unpredictability of how State High winter sports teams will fare in their respective postseasons. 

As for the board’s location in the North Gym, the athletic department took a unique approach. 

“Right now, the plan is to have it split,” Crispell said. “One half of the board, with the time, score, and some of the game details, would be on one half, for one side of the gym, and the video portion on the other.”

The North Gym holds many memories of packed games, special moments, and enthused crowds, but an aspiration for the video board is to increase the overall atmosphere in the gym. 

“I think [the video board] will be great in getting fans more excited, more pumped up for games, while also attracting more attention and hopefully more people,” Carr said.

Another exciting aspect of the project is its endless advertising potential. During certain seasons, the board could be in use five nights a week in front of crowds full of community members of all ages, which is certainly appealing to local businesses looking to advertise. 

Aside from the obvious functions of a scoreboard, Crispell stated that the intention is to use the board to its fullest potential, and some luxuries come along with that.

A few of the luxury possibilities include team introduction videos or player graphics that display statistics or facts to help the crowd get to know each student-athlete.

“We want to try to use it in every way possible to highlight the student-athlete experience here at State High,” Crispell said. “Not just the student-athlete experience, but what it is like here…I think we have a lot we can tell that other schools probably can’t.”

By the time the boys volleyball season begins, the video board should be fully installed and ready for use, bringing life to the legendary North Gym and commencing a new era for State High Athletics.