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Board proposes stricter athletics rules

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Comments (10)

Tuesday, August 11, 2009

(Updated 2:13 pm)

By J. Brian Ewing
Staff Writer

GREENSBORO — Parents and coaches would have to adhere to stricter rules governing student-athletes in Guilford County if the school board adopts a new policy that sets requirements for grades, verifying home addresses and penalties for fraud.

As proposed, policy highlights are:

Student-athletes must annually prove their residence by providing two documents showing their address.
If a student enrolls at a school outside his or her district for courses not recognized as a program by the school system, such as a foreign language, the student is not eligible to play sports for 365 days.
Students must earn an unweighted grade-point-average of 2.0 each semester. Freshmen are automatically eligible to play in their first semester but must earn a GPA of at least 1.50 in their first semester to be eligible to play in the second.
Summer school courses can be used to recover credit affecting eligibility but must be factored into the original GPA.
If a student is found ineligible and participates, which includes practicing or attending a team meeting, the student is kicked off the team and the team forfeits all games won while the student participated.
Students who are suspended cannot participate. Students who are absent cannot participate that day, with exceptions for issues such as funerals and college visits.

The policy also would establish an athletics eligibility committee responsible for investigating alleged residence fraud.

The school board originally reviewed the policy in June, but made several changes, mostly clarifications, after the board received public comments. School board member Nancy Routh leads the committee responsible for writing the policy. She said her committee will recommend getting public comment on the revised policy for another week before bringing it up for approval.

Routh, who typically does not discuss how she will vote for items before they are debated, said she fully supports this policy.

“This is one I can tell you I can support and will support,” she said.

Leigh Hebbard, the school system’s director of athletics, said the policy shows the system will not tolerate any impropriety.

“I don’t know that there’s anything that will stop absolutely everything, but it will make people more aware of the expectations in Guilford County,” Hebbard said.

Hebbard noted the policy is based on N.C. High School Athletic Association policies, which coaches and athletes are required to adhere to already. He said most coaches and school athletics directors support the policy.

“I wouldn’t have put it forward if there wasn’t a consensus,” he said.

If the board approves the policy, Hebbard said, the next step will be educating coaches and parents about the rules.

John Hughes, athletics director at Northwest Guilford High, welcomes the changes. “All those changes are long overdue,” he said.

People have taken advantage of the system for years, sending children to schools outside of their district to play sports, much to the frustration of honest coaches, he said. The new policy means more work and responsibilities for coaches, but Hughes said it would be worth it if there are fewer ineligible players.

“At least we have more oversight over kids moving from one school to another,” he said.

The policy proposal comes just a week after Superintendent Maurice “Mo” Green closed the athletics investigation at Northern Guilford High. That investigation, prompted by numerous complaints from the community and within the school system, found 12 student-athletes were enrolled at the school despite living outside of the school’s district.

The findings involved 10 teams and led to the resignation of the school’s principal and athletics director, the banning of the men’s basketball coach, the firing of a custodian and several hundred dollars in fines. Teams also forfeited games or entire seasons and the basketball team was stripped of its state championship.

Contact J. Brian Ewing at 373-7351 or brian.ewing@news-record.com

Accompanying Photos

Margaret Baxter (News & Record)

Want to go?

What: Guilford County Board of Education meeting

When: 6 p.m. today

Where: Board room of the administrative office, 712 N. Eugene St., Greensboro

On TV: Meetings are broadcast live on GCS cable channel 2, with replays aired at 1 and 7 p.m. the next day. and at 1 p.m the Saturdays after the meeting.

Want to be heard? Those wishing to address the board should call 370-8100 before 5 p.m. or sign up at the meeting site at 5:45 p.m.

Full agenda and live video: gcsnc.com/boe/agenda.htm

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dalekm123

August 11, 2009 - 7:26 am EDT

This is a good start and shows that GCS means business.

GCS...YOU will need to monitor this proposal, as I am sure there will always be some staff, parents and students who will look for creative ways to manipulate the system.

Mick

August 11, 2009 - 8:02 am EDT

I do not reallly have a problem with the rules/regs. My problem comes when rules appear to only apply to athletes and not the general student body. Do people really think the illegal swimmer or jv cheerleader were at NG for sports?!

It is patently unfair to single out athletes. Illegally attending a school isnt confined to just sports. Kids should attend their assigned school or magnet school/program of choice or acquire a legal above board transfer. I dont care if the kid is a star athlete or a brainiac.

Enforce the rules for all students.

Panacea

August 11, 2009 - 9:07 am EDT

Students transferring for academic reasons do not have the blatant reputation for fraud that the athletes have acquired.

If students are transferring to academic programs are breaking rules, it should be investigated. If you have information you should pass it on to the appropriate authority.

Otherwise, get over it. Athletes were caught red-handed breaking the rules and this is the expected consequence.

Man up and admit these kids did wrong, and show them you support the idea that wrong actions have consequences.

Mick

August 11, 2009 - 9:32 am EDT

I do wholeheartedly believe that the students in question at NG did wrong and fully support the punishments, consequences, etc. I thought I was pretty clear on that here and on other posts. Read my post above and tell me how you see diff? I also readily admit the athletes are a far higher profile. I also believe that there would be a few non-athletes caught red handed if they were to be investigated. But they were not. I still do not believe some kid/family lied so he/she could be on the swim team. That kid wasnt there for sports even though he/she was an athlete. The reason was not the swim team... trust me.

My whole point is to enforce the rules for all, period. Not just athletes. Always has been so. Anything else is just plain wrong and wrong headed. Goose/Gander type of thing. Do not single out athletes. Particularly, as you have noted, that academic programs abound for legal transfers.

Did I miss your post on the academic magnet programs at NG?

record2009

August 11, 2009 - 8:41 am EDT

Included in the form which parents and students are required to sign is a statement that the athlete or parent are not aware of any ineligible students at their school. The next statement states that the athlete and parent are required to turn in any ineligible athletes if they have knowledge of an ineligible athlete in their sport or school. The Guilford County Schools are making it a requirement that the athlete and parents police/spy on other athletes and parents and report their suspicions. Then I guess that the school system will investigate and make a determination whether the allegation is true or not. This part of the process should be given more consideration in that a disgruntled athlete, student, or parent can really do damage to another student. Will the accused be allowed to continue playing the sport while the investigation is conducted or will the student be suspended from athletic participation while an investigation is conducted? If the allegation is determined to be untrue, then the student athlete may have been denied participation in games in which they were eligible. On the other hand, if the allegation is found to be true, then the team forfeits those games in which the accused was allowed to participate.
What is the process to protect the student-athlete who may have a future college career train wrecked by high school administrators who are more concerned about their own careers in GCS than the damage they could cause to a student-athlete? Hopefully, this will not occur, but I am not sure based on the policies and procedures which the system is developing. One final note, I understand that coaches etc. are required to sign some type of statment. I wonder what their requirements are. Since we don't know what their forms state, are we as parents required to report coaches who violate their signed forms? If a coach is suspended during and investigation, what happens to the team etc?

DaveW

August 11, 2009 - 11:03 am EDT

record2009
I attended the coaches meeting last week on the new eligibility requirements. I have that information at school and not at home. When I get back to school and have time I will look over them and try my best to answer your questions in another post.You do make some good points.
From the other posts on this subject. If a non athlete is in another school illegally and does not call attention to himself/herself they can often get away with it by keeping a low profile. Athletes, particularly those in football or basketball or really outstanding ones in an individual sport like track or wrestling would have a problem keeping that low profile due to the recognition that almost automatically comes their way. Years ago I had a female student that was doing a pretty good job in my class for most of the year and then suddenly started misbehaving. I (with much effort) finally found an accurate phone number for her parents. I noticed the number did not look like others from our school district(this was when we still were land line for the most part). I then discovered the address was not in our district and I turned her in to the administration and she was later sent to the school in her correct attendance zone. The point is had she not called attention to herself to the point that I had to make a parent contact she would have continued to attend our school. Students that get any kind of attention(negative or positive) will be scrutinized about their addresses.

angie123

August 11, 2009 - 12:14 pm EDT

I also would like to see what is required of the coaches - particularly those who are not faculty members or employees of GCS. Also, I am aware of many coaches who have already been hired for the 2009-2010 school year and are not employees of GCS. Have they managed to get through the system without having to go through the scrutiny that the school board has just dictated?

dcolin

August 11, 2009 - 1:26 pm EDT

John Hughes, athletics director at Northwest Guilford High, welcomes the changes. “All those changes are long overdue,” he said.

People have taken advantage of the system for years, sending children to schools outside of their district to play sports, much to the frustration of honest coaches, he said. The new policy means more work and responsibilities
Mr. Hughes is a bit disengenuous don't you think.
Talk about taking advantage.

See Below

Manny Bloom
NW BBall coach
JOB TITLE: TEACHER-BEHAVIOR IMPROVEMENT (HIGH SCHOOL)
GENERAL STATEMENT OF JOB
Under general supervision, the Teacher-Behavior Improvement serves as the administrator for
student discipline. Under direction of the school principal, oversees the discipline plan and
activities/programs which enable students to acquire the social and interpersonal behaviors
necessary for academic achievement.
This is Manny's Job Description.
He is not listed as a, administrator, teacher, faculty.
Look at NW WEB site.
Only basketball coach.
"serves as the administrator for
student discipline."
Certainly he has the highest ethical background.
to help troubled youth. Don't you think?
Misled GCS to get employed.
Has been disciplined
Serious charges at last position
K-6 certificate ( no course he can teach )
Yes the School Leaders ( with all their Ed.D's ) are a farce..
They wanted a bball coach and created a phantom position.
Nobody in their right mind would put this guy in charge of troubled kids.
Shame on us

Now no hearsay here just facts.
It is a Marx’s brothers movie. Honk Honk

gsosportsguy

August 11, 2009 - 4:29 pm EDT

While I understand the importance of academics and the need for a min. G.P.A. what happens when a football player drops below a 2.0 and sees a trumpet player in the band that has a 1.5 still being eligible for an extracurricular activity? Same thing with chorus.

Any thoughts? I could see this becoming a problem if someone wanted to challenge it.

DaveW

August 11, 2009 - 8:22 pm EDT

Band and chorus are actual classes taken for credit during the school day. So even if you are not doing well academically you can still take those courses. Athletics is the only extracurricular that has any academic and attendance requirements for participation. It has been that way for at least 30 years if not longer.