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Along with worries about head injuries, numbers are down because there are fewer families in the city.

” ‘I will never guarantee you that your kid is not going to get injured or a concussion,’ I tell parents, but I also tell them we teach them how to make a correct tackle and take a tackle, and we do it until its automatic,” Lee said.

This was also the first year coaches and referees were required to take concussion-awareness and recognition training, he pointed out.

“We do recognize and remove. If there’s even a question, we remove the player from the game or practice,” he said. “We had to take the training before we did any practices. Fifteen years ago we were still saying, ‘What’s a concussion?,’ now we’re not.”

But he also knows the experience in Vancouver’s public schools isn’t universal: the game still has strong participation in the Fraser Valley and at private schools like St. George’s. From Grades six to 12 rugby at the west-side Vancouver private school is booming, Chris Blackman, head of athletics at St. George’s Senior School, said.

“We’ve had our biggest year in terms of numbers of boys participating. A huge number are multi-sport athletes too. The largest group of our grads who continue with a sport after high school are rugby boys,” he said.

The president of the provincial schools rugby union, retired teacher Stephen Rowell, said the game remains strong.

“I do feel overall it’s never been stronger, but we have to put it in context,” he said. “Yes, we have fewer AA teams but we’ve taken on a new sevens initiative, the goal is to have more players playing rugby.”