Lacrosse Logic
March 6, 2012
Sometimes the administrators of school sports will be heard to say, “Is ours the only sport program that cares about kids’ well-being?” Or, “Are we the only folks willing to both make and enforce rules to protect the program and its participants?”
So, there are feelings of vindication and validation when we read about other sports programs which see and do some things somewhat our way. And it appears US Lacrosse is one of those groups. Here’s some of what is included in its Oct. 30, 2011 Position Statement: “Boys’ and Girls’ Youth Lacrosse Participation Recommendations.”
“1. Athletes at all level of play should have 1-2 days off per week from competitive athletics and training to allow for recovery.“2. Athletes at the U-9, U-11, U-13 and U-15 level should have at least 2-3 months away from sport specific training and competition during the year.“3. Athletes at the U-9, U-11, U-13 and U-15 level should play on only one lacrosse team during a season. If an athlete is playing on more than one team in the same season, they should not participate for more than 16-20 hours per week.”“6. Encourage participation in multiple sports throughout the year and avoid sports specialization before the U-15 age group (high school). Those athletes who choose to specialize in the sport of lacrosse in high school will need to take extra precaution with regard to overuse injuries and burnout. While there may be potential benefits to extra training, the risks of becoming one-dimensional at a young age needs to be evaluated on a seasonal basis. Furthermore, specialization does not guarantee improved play or college acceptance and only an estimated 5 percent of high school senior athletes progress to play some form of collegiate sports. Some researchers believe there is a benefit to multiple sport participation throughout high school.”
Cooperative Concerns
July 12, 2016
When an organization receives positive media attention for a policy change, it’s probably best to accept the praise and get back to work. But that could be too easy and miss some teachable moments.
This summer, the Michigan High School Athletic Association has been the recipient of unqualified praise for allowing two or more high schools of any size to jointly sponsor sports teams at the subvarsity level, and for relaxing enrollment limits so that two or more high schools of the same school district could jointly sponsor varsity teams in all sports except basketball and football.
Media seemed to think that this was something revolutionary in Michigan. In fact, the concept of what we call “cooperative programs” in Michigan was borrowed from other Midwest states and began in Michigan during the 1988-89 school year when seven cooperative programs were first approved. Those seven co-ops involved 13 of the MHSAA’s smallest high schools.
Over the next almost three decades, policies have been revised over and over to assist students in schools of larger enrollments, sports of low participation and schools with special circumstances. All of this is admirable; but to be frank, not all results are positive.
The idea of cooperative programs is to increase opportunity. That has often occurred. But increasingly, schools are entering into co-ops not to create new opportunities for participation where they did not exist, but to save opportunities for participation where existing participation is declining – or worse, to combine two viable teams into one to save money.
This trend, and the slight softening of the fundamental principle of educational athletics – that each student competes for his or her own school’s teams – should soften the praise for our most recent expansion of cooperative programs in Michigan.
Entering 2016-17, the MHSAA has nearly 300 high school cooperative programs for nearly 500 sports teams, and nearly 100 junior high/middle school cooperative programs for approximately 340 sports teams. A growing number are not being created with the lofty goals of 1988-89. Instead of the word “create,” we more often see the word “survive” in the cooperative team applications.