I happened to catch a tweet from @jenmenke the other day that brought to light something that may become very common this year. Schools are faced with some tough decisions:
Just heard our school district may be cutting high school soccer to meet budget. Very bad news.
Tax revenues are falling across the country as the economy continues to decline. Schools are facing serious budget shortfalls, with many in dire straights because they could never get fully funded during the boom times. My kid’s elementary schools are already running out of supplies and out of money to buy more this year. Does this mean school sports programs could be cut?
School districts have threatened to cut sports programs to get bonds and budgets passed by voters for years. But that was usually to fund new school construction and such. This is different. Tax revenue is cliff diving, and schools are facing some very serious choices in the coming year. This might be the time when districts have to cut sports to balance their budgets. The key is will the cuts be fair?
Now, we all know it’ll be a cold day in hell before any HS football program gets cut. Some things are just sacred in the id of America. The schools would have to be borderline having their electricity cut off for non payment before the cut football. But, football programs are also notorious over funded compared to other sports. So if your district starts making noise about cutting sports, the only way to save your sport (be it soccer or something else) is to raise enough ruckus and ask what cuts are being made to football as well. Share the pain. Because for many schools, they’ll happily cut an entire sport like soccer before they cut one of the dozen or so assistant coaches a football program might have.
So parents need to be vigilant about this. It may not change things, but you never know. Local youth leagues also need to stay engaged. Your players will want to play for their school – you should try to ensure they have a program to go to. Rally your parents and send them to a board meeting. If 20% of our league’s parents went to a board meeting (200) – it would make a heck of a point.
So just keep your eyes and ears open as to when your district will be publicizing budget drafts and when they’ll be discussing them. Go to a board meeting and ask them flat out what they’re thinking related to sports and the upcoming budgets.
School and education come first – obviously. If sports have to be cut to keep budgets afloat during these tough times, so be it. But just make sure the cuts are fair to all and not targeted at sports that certain ADs may not understand or like.
Is your district considering drastic steps like this? Are the cuts across the board or targeted?
March 6th, 2009 at 5:10 pm
After watching (via the NC Soccer Forums) the drama unfold in Moore County, I can imagine what an uphill battle it might be to save a soccer program if it has to take on football.
In our county, the school district provides no funding for sports beyond paying the staff. School booster clubs fund everything else.
March 7th, 2009 at 7:10 am
No kidding. The point that so many there lost was that it wasn’t just about that one coach being let go. It was about the allegations that the football program/supporters orchestrated his removal because his program was to successful or he didn’t lay down for the football program. Everyone wanted to harp about was he a good coach/bad coach. It seemed to miss the bigger picture.
I drive by our middle school last night and saw the middle school team practicing on a field that slopes a solid 5 feet from touch line to touch line – its a pasture, and they’re being coached by a really nice guy, who knows nothing about soccer. He just offered to coach the team because the school wouldn’t pay anyone to coach it AND refused to let a professional coach, who also does skills training for our league, do it for free. I kid you not.
March 10th, 2009 at 8:32 am
They wouldn’t let a professional coach do it for free? What kind of mindset is that?
Unfortunately, coaching situation is not unusual. My son’s middle school team was lucky in the respect that over half the players played club ball, so they pretty much coached themselves and were successful. The coach was just there to provide adult supervision.
Fortunately for my son’s high school team, conflict between football is pretty minimal. The soccer team has their own game field, complete with lights, bleachers and concession stand. The school often offers free tickets to the Friday night football games for anyone who attends a varsity soccer game on Thursday night. For rivalry games, football players will turn out to support the soccer team, which draws a lot of other students as well. About the only conflict I’ve seen is that the soccer players get kicked out of the weight room whenever the football team wants to use it.
March 10th, 2009 at 9:10 am
I like the complementary ticket idea and good to see both teams support each other. We’re hemmed in by a reservoir, so soccer and football have to share.
But I agree – it seems most middle school coaches just provide supervision. Good news is they can play club year round and choose to play MS if they want. My son got asked to be a ‘manager’ for his MS team and we discouraged it – just not worth the time investment. if he wants to play next year – that’s fine IF he can manage the hit on his time and keep his grades up.
Oh and the reason they didn’t let the coach ‘volunteer’? Because it wouldn’t be fair to the other schools.