As a student at Penn State, Mike Ross worked numerous sports officiating jobs, including at the White Building on the University Park campus and for Penn State Intramural Sports as well as off-campus for the Centre Region Parks and Recreation agency.
“I've always enjoyed officiating and the satisfaction that comes from running an event,” Ross said. “The energy and excitement that comes from the participants, and knowing that I was part of it, was really fulfilling to me.”
Ross graduated from Penn State in 2010 with a degree in recreation, park and tourism management (RPTM). He took that degree and his experiences at Penn State and turned them into a business -- Mile High Sport & Social Club in Colorado, which he started with his fiancée, Erin Shaw. Mile High Sport & Social Club provides different types of recreation for adults, including sports leagues, pick-up games, tournaments and socials.
“The concept of the company is just an extension of my experience at Penn State,” Ross said.
Ross and Shaw expanded the concept beyond simply running games to also working with city park districts, private facilities and sponsors to create an entire package of experiences for players.
“We provide not only an event but leverage the size of our participants to establish a sponsor restaurant or bar after the event to provide a more social atmosphere for our participants to engage in as well,” Ross said.
Ross and Shaw are also actively engaging in relationships with nonprofit organizations to establish club events for service volunteer opportunities for their members.
Ross, who grew up in Meadville, believes his time at Penn State, particularly his RPTM courses, prepared him for this entrepreneurial journey.
“Penn State was truly invaluable for my current venture. The RPTM major does a thorough job of providing real hands-on experiences like planning, developing, implementing and running actual community events,” Ross said. “The majority of course work supplements real-life applications such as business plans, networking, recreation for persons with disabilities, participant engagement and leadership, which I use every day to build and improve Mile High Sport & Social Club.”
Patricia Kleban, a senior RPTM instructor, described Ross as someone with “high energy," who had the ability to make others immediately feel comfortable. She also noted that Ross remains connected to Penn State, in part, by assisting student interns.
“He embodies the ‘people person,’ which describes so many of our students,” Kleban said. “Mike has taken his love for sports, those people skills and his RPTM education, and created not only a successful business but a great service to his community.”
Ross said the highlight of his job is the opportunity to meet and build relationships with people from all walks of life while providing them with an enjoyable experience, so enjoyable it keeps people coming back.
“Building this company is a balance between providing a fantastic event, whether it's a league game, drop-in game or social event, and spending time meeting new people and getting them to come out to an event,” Ross said. “The satisfaction of introducing new players to our club and the joy they experience at our events with us is truly fulfilling.”
The challenging part, like most companies, is getting started, Ross said. Ross only recently returned to Denver after living in another state for more than a year, which made building networks a challenge. The company’s first event had fewer than 15 participants show up, he said.
“This model is definitely an exponential growth model. It takes an enormous amount of energy to get the first website hits and the first emails to come in, to help spread awareness of your company, to get players to actually register, pay and show up,” Ross said,” but once it starts, it does become a little bit easier.”