Brandon Stooksbury

Please indicate past awards won/recognitions:
PGA Section Teacher of the Year, GRAA Growth of the Game Teaching Professional, Golf Digest Best in State, Other (Indicate specific awards in 3-a below)

Other awards won (if provided):
3x PGA Section “Professional Development Award” winner / Golf Digest “Best Young Teacher” 2014-2022

Total number of individual lessons given per year:
Male: 900
Female: 150
Junior: 300

Total number of individual clinics given per year:
20

Please indicate any Growth of the Game initiatives your facility/academy has launched over the past year (please give specifics on such programs):
Since reopening the golf course in 2022 after being closed for a year for a complete renovation, my professional staff and I started the Player Development Program from scratch. We were all new to the facility and no organized programming existed before. We introduced the following programs:
• Operation 36 Junior Programming: junior golf instruction program consisting of a 1-hour group clinic per week covering the 12 core golf skills with optional supervised practice session and private instruction add-on. Also includes a quarterly “match” held on-course where participants try to “break par” by shooting a score of 36 or better beginning at 25 yards away from the flag and progressively moving further away in 25-yard increments. Program is offered in the following groups/age brackets:
o Future 36’s (ages 4-6)
o Young Guns (ages 7-10)
o Junior Champions (ages 11-13)
• Golf Fitness: partnering with a TPI Fitness instructor (who is also on the golf staff as a part-time assistant professional), we began incorporating a fitness element into all our Operation 36 programming and individual lessons. The very first lesson with any new student was scheduled as an “evaluation” and included a TPI fitness screen.
• Summer Junior Camps: weekly half-day and full-day camps held monthly throughout the summer season.

In the calendar year 2023 we added/accomplished the following:
• Introduced the PGA Junior League programming with two in-house teams
• Grew participation in the Operation 36 program by 20% above 2022 numbers
• Introduced a winter “holiday” junior camp program
• Introduced a new “Ladies Instruction” series clinics

Please share any programming you have made to keep your customers & students engaged:
The following programs were introduced to increase engagement, either in between regular lessons, or as an introduction into our instruction programming:

• “Instruction Night:” monthly, complimentary adult clinics on varying topics. We started this in 2022 and have now expanded it in 2023 to offer more dates
• Mandatory, scheduled golf with members: The professional staff is now scheduled for one “open to play” shift weekly and are required to play with members after their opening shift.
• Introduced two “Etiquette and Responsibility” series aimed at educating golfers on the proper etiquette of playing the game and the proper maintenance practices (raking bunkers, filling divots, repairing ball marks, etc.)