ALUMNI: Emily Glass
By Meseret Carver,
Bluedevilhub.com Staff–
Davis High alumna Emily Glass, 21, was recently selected for the Watson Fellowship to study baseball internationally. The Fellowship offers 40 college graduates the opportunity to travel and explore a topic of their choice outside of the United States on a $30,000 scholarship. Glass will be studying gender issues in the male-dominated game in the Netherlands, Dominican Republic, Australia and Japan, in a program called Reconciling with the Diamond.
“I always thought it was unfair that women play softball and men play baseball,” said Glass, who graduated in 2011.
Glass herself has a history with both sports; her father and brother started coaching her at a young age. She started playing baseball at six and switched to softball at 13. At first, Glass didn’t like softball, but as she grew older she learned to love it.
Glass starred on the DHS varsity softball team all four years of her high school career.
“I wouldn’t be here today without the passions I was able to develop and the skills I was able to learn at DHS,” she said.
After graduating, Glass attended Pomona College, where she played for the Pomona-Pitzer Sagehens for two years and helped lead the team to the best record in school history. However, in her second year at Pomona, the team struggled and she did not enjoy the game as much as she used to.
“Losing caused me strife,” Glass said. She was deeply affected by the losses and her love for the game diminished. Instead of continuing to play at this competitive level, Glass decided to direct her passions to other areas.
Glass has always been a passionate person; At DHS, she was a Friendship Day Facilitator, and was part of the group that recruited new members for the upcoming year. She cried on recruitment day because she felt so strongly about who should join the program.
“She is a genuine person,” said Friendship Day director and history teacher Kevin Williams. “[She kept] the friendship-ship moving.”
Through the Reconciling with the Diamond program, Glass is now using her passion to help a cause important to her.
This past summer, Glass was in the Dominican Republic studying the baseball communities in the country.
“If the Watson Foundation had not given me this opportunity to expose myself and my opinions to the world, I doubt I’d be attempting to conceive of ways in which more women in the Dominican Republic could receive an education,” Glass said.
After the Dominican Republic, she traveled to Puerto Rico to work with a baseball academy.
Glass, who has been blogging about her travels, says she has met many teachers, coaches and players who have welcomed her with open arms in Puerto Rico.
The academy coaches all introduce Glass as “someone striving to be the the second female MLB coach.” She is involved in the games at the academy, and if she has any questions, the prospects gladly answer them for her.
