1

The spectators are on the edges of their seats. The homecoming king and queen are about to be announced. The announcement will be followed by the football game. Everyone in the stands is talking excitedly about who they voted for, what the homecoming court’s dresses look like, and where the party is after the game. Everyone, that is, but you. Your Friday night consists of a swim meet. The meet is an hour and a half away, which means that even if it ends early, you won’t make it back for the pep rally or the game. Each year, many high school athletes are torn between their social lives and their teams. Many high schools create this strain on their athletes by planning too many events for the same day. If schools submitted a list of blackout dates to the Illinois High School Association (IHSA), schedules could be devised that minimize overlap with other high school events.

2

Time conflicts between sports and social events are nothing new. Most high school athletes know what it’s like to have a meet or a game when all their friends are at another high school event. Coaches know what it’s like as well, since ditching practices and even games on the day of a major social event is common among players. If there weren’t conflicts in sports schedules, high school athletes would be able to participate in sports without sacrificing other high school events. Students could enjoy the social aspect of high school as well as play sports. Athletes could fully focus on their sports without needing to worry about making an event. More students might get involved in athletics if they knew that there wouldn’t be conflicts.

3

I propose that student associations submit lists of dates when certain social events will be scheduled and that sports teams declare those dates to be blackout days on which meets should not be scheduled if another option is available. This solution costs nothing and would take hardly any time to implement. A schedule has to be made at some point, so why not put a little extra consideration into it? If just a few major conflicts could be avoided, many people would benefit. To start, a list of events and dates should be submitted by the student association. The athletic director can then contact the IHSA with the dates, and the IHSA can create a schedule that avoids as many of the blackout dates as possible. This would benefit high school athletes and therefore parents and coaches by allowing student athletes to participate both in sports and in social events. If schools want every sport and club supported to the fullest, they have to give everyone the opportunity to be in attendance.

4

If a survey were taken, the overwhelming majority of students polled would want the opportunity to be on a sports team as well as attend major high school social events. The superintendent at Riverside/Brookfield High School in Illinois, Dr. Jack Bladermann, is an advocate of supporting all teams and clubs. He thinks that if schedules were more carefully designed, the number of students joining extracurricular activities would go up.

5

The problem of students quitting teams and clubs at midseason has usually been addressed within the sports team or high school rather than at the level of the IHSA. Those students usually say that their reason for leaving the organization is that the time commitment conflicts with their social life. These conflicts in the schedule are avoidable. If events were scheduled on different days, teams and clubs could retain more students.

6

During my sophomore year in high school, Mollie, a girl from our swim team, almost had to quit the team to accommodate two separate events. That year, a swim meet was scheduled for the same day as the homecoming pep rally. Mollie was a senior and had been chosen for the homecoming court, which was supposed to attend a pep rally leading up to the announcement of homecoming king and queen. My coach thought that the team’s performance would suffer if Mollie wasn’t at the meet, but in the end, Mollie chose to go to the pep rally. We came in second at the meet by only a few points. Mollie’s contribution could have given us first place. Had the pep rally and the swim meet been scheduled for different dates, this situation could have been avoided.

7

Some readers may have objections to my proposal, including students who aren’t affected by this particular situation. I would ask them to put themselves in the athletes’ position. The four years of high school should be the greatest years of our lives — years filled with a variety of events, not years in which we routinely have to make stressful decisions in which we sacrifice one event over another, and potentially affect entire teams.

8

Others may object that this solution makes work for the IHSA. This drawback could be avoided by moving the bulk of the scheduling work to the high school level; high schools could schedule as many events as possible together and then collaborate to create a master list of blackout dates. If, however, it’s difficult for more than a few high schools to schedule together, the IHSA could take a different approach, scheduling meets only on certain days of the week. For example, avoiding scheduling meets on Fridays would be helpful because that is when most football teams have games and when most major social events are scheduled. Each high school could also have set make-up days at the end of the season. That way, if an unavoidable conflict does arise, it won’t be a struggle to fit the meet in at the end of the season. Most important, though, if a conflict cannot be avoided, teams can alert the players at the beginning of the season before they commit to a team so that students can choose between a social event and team participation before it becomes an issue that affects the rest of the team.

9

This proposal would be simple to implement. If players, coaches, student associations, athletic directors, and the IHSA all did their part, the benefits of the solution would be numerous. By creating a list of blackout dates, conflicts could be avoided, more high school students could participate in sports without sacrificing social events, and more time for extracurricular activities would be available. Athletes could focus fully at meets, instead of thinking about what they’re missing at a social event taking place at the same time. More students would get involved if they knew there wouldn’t be conflicting interests. Athletes could enjoy the social aspect of high school as well as participate in team sports. Teams wouldn’t have to suffer because of inadequate planning. All players could attend all meets because there would be no — or very few — scheduling conflicts. Make-up days set at the end of the season could be used for unavoidable conflicts. Finally, making the players aware of unavoidable conflicts before the start of the season would prevent last-minute decisions that could hurt the team.