It’s Change, Not Status
January 5, 2016
When I see a professional sports team install a scoreboard that is more expensive than the total of the interscholastic athletic budgets of the two dozen high schools closest to that stadium, I gripe.
When I see a half-dozen medical professionals scamper out to attend to an injured college football player, and then watch a local high school junior varsity soccer game where no medical professional is present, I grieve.
But in spite of these dispiriting moments, I never wish that my life’s work had been at those higher levels. Long ago I was impressed by the statement that we should measure impact by change, not by status.
It is at the school sports level, much more than at so-called higher levels, that lives are changed. No glitz. No glamour. Just huge results, with limited resources.
The Limitation of Rules – Part 2
September 6, 2016
There may be an inverse relation between the length of the Michigan High School Athletic Association Handbook and the commitment to follow its rules.
There seems an increasingly popular attitude that if something isn’t specifically prohibited, then it’s permitted. The question is more often “Is it legal?” and less often “Is it right?” Technical integrity rather than ethical integrity.
There may not be more rule breakers today, but there sure seems to be more rule benders – people at the borders of what is allowed, testing limits.
Which leads to an even longer Handbook as efforts are made to plug the holes and fill the gaps.
Which is a temptation we must resist, for we cannot keep up. Like a dog chasing its tail, we’ll go in circles. Getting dizzy. Losing sense of what is important.
We were successful in that the 2016-17 MHSAA Handbook has the same number of Interpretations as the year before. A whopping 284 Interpretations. Our goal for 2017-18 should be fewer.