TSSAA Proposals.....

[deadlift]

What does everyone think about these proposals?

 

http://www.dnj.com/story/sports/2015/08/28/tssaa-proposal-move-schools-division-ii/71292810/

[PennStateWrestlingFan]

I personally am for it as long as we are going to keep the divisions split. Since I can't see us going back to one division, I like these changes. This proposal seems like a better way to split the schools, so the schools that can't pay for the tuition of students or accept out of county kids would not be at a disadvantage. Whether anyone wants to admit it or not, I feel that this "financial aid" is often used in the wrong way. I would prefer one division where no out of county/state and no financial aid is allowed creating a level playing field for all. Obviously this will never happen though.

 

If anyone knows, who are the teams that this would affect? It would be interesting to know as this could create a lot interesting matchups we might of previously never seen in February.

[deadlift]

It looks like it may affect many schools. It could change the way many programs are currently doing business. Open enrollment counties and school systems with "STEM" Academies could possibly be affected greatly. There's a lot of questions. How would it affect "magnet" schools? How would it affect off season clubs, open mats and "fight nights"?

Edited August 29, 2015 by deadlift

[durdon]

Just a first reading of this and I'm just looking at the rules that would affect youth and middle school wrestling as that is all I am familiar with. I don't know enough about HS wrestling to have and option on aid or private school stuff.

 

My take is that if all of the proposals are accepted as is, it will all but eliminate open mats, fight nights and cause high schools and middle schools to heavily restrict club use of their facilities. Any interaction between a club kid or someone at open mats and a member of the high school coaching staff at that school would put the High school eligibility of that youth wrestler at risk. The knee jerk reaction by a lot of AD's is going to simply not let the club's use their facilities anymore. We are already fighting for any mat space and gym time we can get at the youth and MS CLUB level and this would really impact us tremendously. Deadlift the way 2 of those proposals are written your oldest son wouldn't be able to coach or help with your AAU Club anymore. This will force so many of the high school coaches who have given so much of themselves to help all of the kids involved youth wrestling out and I might add to help kids they know that one day they will be coaching against. Forcing those guys out is bad for our sport. There is only a very small group of guys statewide who are not coaching in HS that are involved in youth wrestling. Our sport needs the high school coaches to be directly involved with our youth and ms club kids to keep the quality up. I know that the rules are geared towards football and basketball but the TSSAA needs to understand the impact it will have on the secondary sports like wrestling where we don't have the resources those sports have...

[rgiii]

Unless I'm reading it wrong , one of the proposals is stating that if a kid attends a camp or open gym time at another school and then transfers to that same school then the kid would be ineligible for a year. It looks like the tssaa is attempting to cut down on schools using these events to attract kids to their schools. It doesn't mention youth clubs at all. I think they are referring to high school age kids . I doubt that would pass anyway. It appears there is more concern over the privates that compete in DI that offer forms of financial aide such as work plans for the parents and kids, religious affiliation discounts and so on. I won't point any schools out but there are a few that recruit as much as DII schools . I think it's a much bigger problem in football and basketball than wrestling. The Tssaa can't legally govern kids sports , they also can not legally tell school

Systems what they can do with their facilities in regards to who can use them. The Tssaa is simply a governing body for high school athletics.

Edited August 29, 2015 by rgiii

[PennStateWrestlingFan]

I agree with rgiii. The way I understand the article, it wouldn't really change that much with fight nights, clubs, open mats etc. We would still be able to run them the same way. However, if someone that it zoned for another school attends one of these events and tries to transfer to that school, they would be ineligible. It sounds like they're trying to put more obstacles in the way of schools trying to stack a team. If it is as durdon says then I think we would all be opposed to that. All that would do is hold TN back even more compared to other states.

Edited August 29, 2015 by PennStateWrestlingFan

[durdon]

The problem is that most of the proposals that are coming up for a vote on Tuesday before the TSSAA board are so horribly written that if they somehow do pass the unintended results would be crippling to our sport.

 

And I'm just talking about the 3 of these proposals specifically target middle school kids and not High school age kids or the private/public school issues.

 

Bottom line if TSSAA passes anyone of these 3 MS Rules ithat affect the eligibility of 9th graders it will cause almost immediately every AD in the state to tell there HS coaches and staff not to have any contact with MS kids. No AD is going to want to to deal with an angry momma bear when their son can't compete in sports in 9th grade simply cause their son had contact with one of their coaches at a camp, open gym, or summer team.

 

I can see how this would be applied and be acceptable for football and basketball because those sports for the most part already have a clear break between high school program and youth/middle school programs and because there are so many people involved in both of those sports that they don't need the support of the high school programs to not only survive but to thrive.

 

Wrestling is different. We are struggling to survive as it is right now and that is with the active support of the high school coaches. The vast majority of our youth club programs won't survive without the active support of the high school coaches.

 

We only have wrestling programs at 27% of our middle schools and of that number almost half aren't officially sanctioned middle school programs because they have to allow kids outside their school districts wrestle for them. They have to because as is they barely have enough kids to field a team even after doing. This rule if enacted as is would eliminate half the affiliated MS teams in the state.

 

As for the summer leagues, this would mean that the high school guys wouldn't be able to help out our state teams that compete in the summer. This year we didn't have enough coaches and support to field a Cadet National team and if it wasn't for Cody Cleveland's involvement, support and giving up 3 weeks of his summer I am certain that we wouldn't have been able to field a schoolboy national team. This proposal if passed as it is written it would keep Cody from doing that next year because any schoolboy on that team who then enrolled at Mccallie would be ineligible to wrestle as a 9th grader. That's how stupid this proposal actually is.

 

If you look at AAU I don't know how we would survive at all at the current level without the involvement and support of the high school coaches and programs.

 

As for camps and open gyms, this would be crippling for our sport. Over the past 3 years, the quality of Middle school and youth wrestling has risen dramatically and it is because statewide we been able get all of the advanced level kids together in the same gym once or twice a month and we can't do that without the active support of HS coaches and programs. We are finally getting TN youth and MS wrestliers to level where they can compete with the best nationally and these MS proposals will crush that.

 

Again in football and basketball it doesn't matter, they have plenty of coaches and money to fully run the Middle school and youth programs without the direct involvement of the High school coaches but in wrestling and all the other secondary sport we simply don't...

[JeremyH]

If they voted against a complete split a little over a month ago why would they adopt these proposals now effectively reversing that decision? I am just asking, I never heard any of the reasoning behind the failure of the complete split on the last vote. Without the reasons the last vote failed I can only wonder why some would believe that these could be adopted now. Would the same people not be voting for these proposals that voted down the complete split?

[deadlift]

This link addresses the decision reached back in July. It states TSSAA would have 2 months after that decision to work out "tweaks" to their bylaws.

The proposals at the beginning of this thread appear to be the tweaks being voted on Tuesday.

http://www.tennessean.com/story/sports/high-school/2015/07/16/tssaa-public-private-split-vote/30217309/

[deadlift]

Today is the day these proposals are supposed to be voted on.

[deadlift]

Five of the proposals passed. The proposal concerning changing the eligibility rules for some middle school transfers in open zones was denied. The council did not take action on a measure that would have defined financial aid as any loan program, grant program, educational foundation or similar program that is established or administered by a school official for an athlete or an athlete's family.

 

http://www.tennessean.com/story/sports/2015/09/01/live-coverage-tssaa-legislative-council-vote/71467148/

http://www.timesfreepress.com/news/sports/preps/story/2015/sep/01/tssaa-vote-could-lead-most-private-schools-out-public-school-league/322962/

 

http://www.knoxnews.com/sports/prepextra/tssaa-vote-alters-landscape-of-high-school-sports_56914030

Edited September 1, 2015 by deadlift

[JeremyH]

Anybody think this all ends with big/small classifications in both divisions?