By Dave Schmidt – www.theseniorreports.com
EDITOR’S NOTE - Red letters
updated from 2013 vote-
The Vote is in....Competitive Balance - http://www.theseniorreports.com/ohiobalance.htm
Information you should know –
*110 signatures of Principals were on the petition. (Only 75 were required, with at least five
signatures from each of the OHSAA’s six districts)
The annual referendum
voting period is
The OHSAA membership
voted down similar proposals in 1978, 1994 and 2013.
Proposal #1: Separate state
championship tournaments in all OHSAA sponsored sports.
a. No divisional structure
change for public schools. (The OHSAA Board of Directors will make the final
determination on divisional structure.)
b. New divisional structure for non-public schools.
(The OHSAA Board of Directors will make the final determination on divisional
structure.)
Proposal #2: Public schools
can only play
There are 831 OHSAA member schools—700 public (84%) and 131
(16%) non-public.
From the beginning of the 1999-2000 school year
through the 2009-10 school year, there were 616 state championships. The
private schools won 275 (45%) of these championships.
Football—66
state championships—31 (47%) won by non-public schools
Volleyball—44 state championships—28 (63%) won by non-public schools
Boys Soccer—33 state championships—15 (45%) won by non-public schools
Girls Soccer—22 state championships—11 (50%) won by non-public schools
Boys Basketball—44 state championships—14 (31%) won by non-public schools
Girls Basketball—44 state championships—23 (52%) won by non-public
schools
Wrestling—30 state championships—21 (70%) won by non-public schools
Baseball—40 state championships—20 (50%) won by non-public schools
Softball—40 state championships—3 (1%) won by non-public schools
The competitive
balance referendum was voted down 339-301 in 2012. The year before, principals
defeated the issue 332-303. This means
that 191 did not vote last year, but five more then the year before. UPDATED
– The 2013 vote for separate
tournaments was withdrawn and a new competitive balance issue was voted on and
defeated - The competitive balance proposal failed 327 to 308 (51.5 percent to
48.5 percent). Almost 20 percent of the more
than 800 member schools did not submit a vote on anything. In all, 164 schools
did not vote, 27 ballots arrived late and four were marked invalid and not
counted.
What does the
OHSAA think about the vote?
^^ "We've
been public about our hope that this does not pass," (OHSAA's
Tim) Stried says. "Let me paint the worst-case scenario
for you: If it passes and the non-public schools are kicked out of the normal
tournament structure and are just playing other private schools, private
schools could certainly withdraw from the association and form their own
association. We are worried that would happen, because there have already been
many private schools that said they would support a new association. If the
private schools form their own association, they will have their own bylaws,
their own regulations, their own everything. So then we're competing for
officials, we're competing for tournament sites, we're competing for all kinds
of things."
# “We have been vocal about that in the months leading up to this moment and we'll be even more vocal about it in the months leading up to the vote,” Stried said. “We will utilize press releases, our website, social media and the annual referendum explanation meetings in April to explain the ramifications of what could happen if that item passes.”
Have you
already decided how your school system will vote on this issue? If not we hope
you will look at some items you may consider when deciding on how you will
vote.
*Form a committee of administration and
school board members to discuss the situation and be sure to keep your district
updated on how you vote on this issue
*Find out how your fellow conference
members will vote on these issues
*Ask area schools on how they might vote
on these issues
*In areas where possible form a small
group of public and privates to discuss the issues to be voted on and work to
find some solutions
*Ask the OHSAA for as much information
as possible on the financial loss or gains from adding more tournaments
*Will private schools leave to form a
new association and how will that make changes in future scheduling for both
sides
*Private schools will you leave if the
vote is to separate tournaments
*Down to 700 public schools, how will
this effect current class sizes in various sports
*Are there advantages to having separate
tournaments and will they solve the issues facing the OHSAA
*If this vote fails to separate
tournaments will your school be willing to move forward
These are just
a few items that we hope you will consider in this very important vote.
Some of the above information came from this article -
http://pressprosmagazine.com/separation-of-public-and-private-school-tournaments
^^ - http://www.athleticbusiness.com/articles/article.aspx?articleid=3938&zoneid=9
# - http://www.mansfieldnewsjournal.com/article/20121206/SPORTS/312060036/1002/rss01
To read about how other states are handling Private vs Public visit – www.theseniorreports.com/shakeup.htm