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What are these advantages that private schools supposedly have?


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2 hours ago, Titan54 said:

No, I think the average private schools kids have inherent advantages.  

Agreed.  It’s just built into the entire relationship.  Very active parents that hold their kids feet to the fire who are generally deferential to coaches and admins.

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2 hours ago, RegionFBFan said:

Well to start, some parents believe in a Faith based education.

It was  literally a contingency of my wife’s acceptance of my marriage proposal some 32 years ago.....along with having to ask her dad.

It was not something I had even considered at the time but was critical to her.  As it turned out, it has become a center point of our lives in every possible way. 

A very happy accident for me.

Sports was never, ever a consideration.

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1 hour ago, Titan54 said:

No, I think the average private schools kids have inherent advantages.  

I think it's about this simple.  If you're going to private school, it's much more likely that you have a parent that cares about you enough to make you and your education a priority.  

Are there any private schools anyone knows of that have a program to send home food with some students on weekends because they know those kids are usually only fed on free/reduced lunch programs at school.  Parents that don't care enough to get them to school consistently or in condition to learn anything (aside from not being fed, also not coming to school well rested or with their personal hygiene attended to).  Some of these kids aren't coming to school with a chance to accomplish much of anything, let alone win state titles in various athletic events.  

Bottom line is that, on-average, the fact that a parent is willing to put their resources into sending their kid to a private school, whatever their reasons are, sadly means they have an advantage that a significant number of kids attending many public schools don't.  

 

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48 minutes ago, DannEllenwood said:

School choice scholarship/vouchers?  Anyone discuss this?

In FWCS, all you have to do is find a class not offered at your school that is offered at the one you want to attend for free.  The amount or transferring that happens every year is ridiculous. Most, not all,  but most happens within the public schools.  The other Allen county schools, you just have to have an address in that location as you can attend. I can’t speak for the other areas of the state but it’s likely similar.

Private schools  hold no advantage other than the traditional commitment and drive to win.  

What I find to be strange is nobody ever talks about the advantages a school with 5300 students might have playing Homestead with half the enrollment, with both teams in classified as 6A.    If you want “fair” which is what the success factor supposedly wants, split all of the Football teams in Indianapolis that have enrollments double that of the lowest participant in 6A and make 2 teams.  Sound idiotic?   So does a rule that punishes a school and students  for excelling over a 2 year period.   For the record, I’m not at all for splitting the 6A schools into 2 teams but I am also not at all in favor of the  success factor.  And certainly not for making a school move up 2 classes.  

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1 hour ago, MHSTigerFan said:

Well, that’s probably true.  But I’m not sure what it has to do with athletics.

Really?  It has to do with EVERYTHING.  It's not limited to athletics but it's certainly not excluded.  

You have two schools both with the same number of kids eligible to play football but one is a private school who has zero of these parents that don't give their own kids a fair chance at a decent education, let alone extra curricular activities.  By comparison, the public school may have 10% or more of their kids coming from situations that make participation in sports or other extra curriculars, let alone success in them, virtually impossible.

Now if you're asking me if it's the IHSAA's job to try to adjust for this, I don't know that to be the case.  

I actually love the success factor.  When a program demonstrates mastery at a certain level, for whatever reason, it gives them a new set of challenges to work towards.  It doesn't discriminate between Pioneer or LCC, Southridge or Andrean.  You dominate your current level, you get an opportunity to win at an even higher level.  You can't hack it there, you go back down.  You dominate, you keep going up.  You compete, you might stick around.  

 

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5 hours ago, XStar said:

I think it's about this simple.  If you're going to private school, it's much more likely that you have a parent that cares about you enough to make you and your education a priority.  

Are there any private schools anyone knows of that have a program to send home food with some students on weekends because they know those kids are usually only fed on free/reduced lunch programs at school.  Parents that don't care enough to get them to school consistently or in condition to learn anything (aside from not being fed, also not coming to school well rested or with their personal hygiene attended to).  Some of these kids aren't coming to school with a chance to accomplish much of anything, let alone win state titles in various athletic events.  

Bottom line is that, on-average, the fact that a parent is willing to put their resources into sending their kid to a private school, whatever their reasons are, sadly means they have an advantage that a significant number of kids attending many public schools don't.  

 

End.  Of.  Thread.

PERFECT SUMMARY.

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4 hours ago, XStar said:

Really?  It has to do with EVERYTHING.  It's not limited to athletics but it's certainly not excluded.  

You have two schools both with the same number of kids eligible to play football but one is a private school who has zero of these parents that don't give their own kids a fair chance at a decent education, let alone extra curricular activities.  By comparison, the public school may have 10% or more of their kids coming from situations that make participation in sports or other extra curriculars, let alone success in them, virtually impossible.

Now if you're asking me if it's the IHSAA's job to try to adjust for this, I don't know that to be the case.  

I actually love the success factor.  When a program demonstrates mastery at a certain level, for whatever reason, it gives them a new set of challenges to work towards.  It doesn't discriminate between Pioneer or LCC, Southridge or Andrean.  You dominate your current level, you get an opportunity to win at an even higher level.  You can't hack it there, you go back down.  You dominate, you keep going up.  You compete, you might stick around.  

 

The fatal flaw of the success factor is that it aims to make life harder on kids who had nothing to do with the success.

”Programs” don’t have success.  Particular kids do.

Should the IHSAA similarly add strokes to the scores of golfers or time to swimmers whose schools happened to have a few standouts the past couple years?

“No, but those are individual sports!”

Not really.  They have both team and individual tournaments.  And the success of a team is going to depend a whole lot on how good their individual athletes are....

...which is no different than football or any other team sport.

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1 hour ago, MHSTigerFan said:

The fatal flaw of the success factor is that it aims to make life harder on kids who had nothing to do with the success.

”Programs” don’t have success.  Particular kids do.

Should the IHSAA similarly add strokes to the scores of golfers or time to swimmers whose schools happened to have a few standouts the past couple years?

“No, but those are individual sports!”

Not really.  They have both team and individual tournaments.  And the success of a team is going to depend a whole lot on how good their individual athletes are....

...which is no different than football or any other team sport.

I have always felt that the success factor is a bandage designed to keep public schools happy which it has done, in a small way.

I’ll take a bit of exception with your “programs don’t have success, kids do statement” as I believe that to be a partial truth but not an exact science.

Look at the “programs” that are repeat visitors to LOS over the past decade, particularly at the mid tier 3A/4A level.  They have a higher percentage of “successful kids” that are ready to step in once upperclassmen graduate.  We could debate WHY all day (which has been discussed by many in this thread).

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11 hours ago, Coach Nowlin said:

Public School can also accept out of boundary students if Family pays tuition.   Most Public schools are open I believe.   

So is it really an advantage?   

I am a little confused then. Why is former Forest Park standout Curt Hopf being punished for transferring to Barr Reeve for Basketball? Would he have been punished if it was a transfer to a private school?

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1 minute ago, RoadRunner said:

I am a little confused then. Why is former Forest Park standout Curt Hopf being punished for transferring to Barr Reeve for Basketball? Would he have been punished if it was a transfer to a private school?

Because of his momma.

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8 hours ago, XStar said:

I think it's about this simple.  If you're going to private school, it's much more likely that you have a parent that cares about you enough to make you and your education a priority.  

Are there any private schools anyone knows of that have a program to send home food with some students on weekends because they know those kids are usually only fed on free/reduced lunch programs at school.  Parents that don't care enough to get them to school consistently or in condition to learn anything (aside from not being fed, also not coming to school well rested or with their personal hygiene attended to).  Some of these kids aren't coming to school with a chance to accomplish much of anything, let alone win state titles in various athletic events.  

Bottom line is that, on-average, the fact that a parent is willing to put their resources into sending their kid to a private school, whatever their reasons are, sadly means they have an advantage that a significant number of kids attending many public schools don't.  

 

.I think we finally agree on something! 

"Pretty simple really.

Socioeconomic factors. Walk down the hallways at a place like Chatard and/or Memorial or any P/P,  then walk down the halls of a public school with a high free/reduced and other factors that may not be ideal for extra-curricular participation. "

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8 hours ago, XStar said:

I think it's about this simple.  If you're going to private school, it's much more likely that you have a parent that cares about you enough to make you and your education a priority.  

Are there any private schools anyone knows of that have a program to send home food with some students on weekends because they know those kids are usually only fed on free/reduced lunch programs at school.  Parents that don't care enough to get them to school consistently or in condition to learn anything (aside from not being fed, also not coming to school well rested or with their personal hygiene attended to).  Some of these kids aren't coming to school with a chance to accomplish much of anything, let alone win state titles in various athletic events.  

Bottom line is that, on-average, the fact that a parent is willing to put their resources into sending their kid to a private school, whatever their reasons are, sadly means they have an advantage that a significant number of kids attending many public schools don't.  

 

Love this.  Well stated.

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9 hours ago, OldschoolFB said:

In FWCS, all you have to do is find a class not offered at your school that is offered at the one you want to attend for free.  The amount or transferring that happens every year is ridiculous. Most, not all,  but most happens within the public schools.  The other Allen county schools, you just have to have an address in that location as you can attend. I can’t speak for the other areas of the state but it’s likely similar.

Private schools  hold no advantage other than the traditional commitment and drive to win.  

What I find to be strange is nobody ever talks about the advantages a school with 5300 students might have playing Homestead with half the enrollment, with both teams in classified as 6A.    If you want “fair” which is what the success factor supposedly wants, split all of the Football teams in Indianapolis that have enrollments double that of the lowest participant in 6A and make 2 teams.  Sound idiotic?   So does a rule that punishes a school and students  for excelling over a 2 year period.   For the record, I’m not at all for splitting the 6A schools into 2 teams but I am also not at all in favor of the  success factor.  And certainly not for making a school move up 2 classes.  

I agree that the open enrollment thing is a joke. But what we see is that those who do transfer are not transferring for athletics so much as they are thinking they can avoid a level of discipline if they stay. We have students who have enrolled the last week or so, who were told if you transfer, we will not expel you......

Soooooo, what you are saying is that the 1,000 or so kids at Dwenger is basically the same as the 1,000 or so at New Haven? Both are 4A schools......with the ONLY difference than the “traditional commitment and drive to win”??????? Seriously? Take one day to walk our halls, and I guarantee that impression will change in a heartbeat.

As others have said, committed parents make a HUGE difference, no doubt about it. What has been basically ignored, outside of a post or two, is the special needs population. Our building alone has about 10% of its population in that category. Very few of them are on diploma track. With certificate track kids in our building the absolute highest possible rate for graduation is at 92%. And there are a number of those kids that have minimal skills. The special education staff in our building makes up 25% of our staff. The new pathways to graduation our ingenious politicians came up with has forced even more lower functioning students into gen ed classes. In one class alone, I have close to half the class that are low functioning. Communication skills are the level of a 2 or 3 year old. I have others in that group that do not communicate at all, are confined to wheelchairs, wear a bib to catch the drool coming out of their mouths, or have other severe disabilities. It fits the schedules of the paras and nurses that have to accompany these students to have them in one period, but they make up 10% of my population for this semester. 
Now who wants to continue the conversation about the REAL differences? And who still actually thinks you are somehow being “punished” for success? When you want to have a REAL conversation about who gets punished for what when schools are classified, let me know. 

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One advantage I see for private schools is that they can say who is in or who is out. They can control their numbers to stay in a certain class unless the success factor is in play. A public school can cap but they also have to let everyone attend that's in the district.

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OK dusting this off from the 3A thread:

 

We all know that with 10k-15k a year in Indy (6K in Evansville) for tuition at a P&P by default the "quality" of student-athlete is generally going to be "higher", for lack of a better word, than the equivalent sized public.  Take for example a GS or HH who probably has some of the lowest free and assisted lunch in the state by percentage of the student body in 3A for publics.  Even with that, GS and HH simply won't have the same number of quality student-athletes walking the halls as their p&p counterparts by the percentage of enrollment (with the exception of some generational aboratinon).  Anyone who denies that is simply hiding their head in the sand.  I can tell you that we have kids at GS (ie part of our enrollment numbers) who are only there because they have a pulse and the law says that they have to be (and we have much less than most other publics our size) not to mention the kids in life-skills based classes.  Again, "generally", folks who can make the sacrifice to send their kids to a P&P have certain qualities in common that I don't need to list here that are both "natured" and "nurtured" into their kids.  

Does this quality "stock" always result in a strong tradition in any sport?  Certainly not, however, when the key variables are in place, the same variables that it takes to have success at a public in a given sport...ie, community, youth league, parent support, coaching etc., those variables are multiplied by a factor "x" across a deeper bench so to speak.

As I have mentioned before, as a case study in the SIAC,  Memorial vs Castle.  This P&P typically runs head to head with its public rival in terms of conference championships boys and girls.  This would indicate both schools have a similar bench depth across a wide variety of sports, boys, and girls.  Castle enrollment 1965,  Memorial enrollment 609.  Castle isn't exactly a district of struggling families.  Some pretty easy math even for a public educated kid can see the disparity here in the ratio there of total enrollment to quality student-athlete.  You see this all over the state.  What does it mean?  Does Memorial have better coaches?  Do memorial kids have a better work ethic?  Is it that the early poor immigrant Catholics into Southwestern Indiana were blue-collared people that instilled an incredible physical culture and work ethic over generations significantly impacting their ability to succeed in girls soccer?

There clearly are some public representatives on the GID that are advocates of "everything is fine" or perhaps that are even against the success factor.  Many of those seem to fall into one of a few buckets:  Those who have advanced in the state tournament over a p&p at some point in school history or public's that are geographically aligned in such a way that they get quality imports or perhaps in such a way that P&Ps aren't an issue in their path.  There will always be a subset with a certain machismo or the "put your head down and go to work" mentality that simply won't admit the above paradigm is simply a fact.  That is the nature of our sport and I wouldn't' change that for the world.  Those folks know it's true but the  "football guy" in them simply won't let admit that there are certain inherent advantages.  Reasonable, intelligent men and women can't debate on if a solution is necessary, if the one we have is adequate or if additional measures are needed at all.   I simply can't wrap my head around how any reasonable person on either side of these arguments can say P&Ps and public are equitably measured by enrollment alone.  Just simply say....sure they have advantages...but I don't care...I like the challenge.  That I can accept.

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There are any number of factors:

Look at the number of kids who participate in extracurriculars at publics vs. privates. Last time I checked it was about 70% in privates vs. about 35% in publics. 

TA often misconstrued this concept, read carefully, kids who attend.  Look at your own programs, look at the kids who work hard, odds are their parents are fairly successful, contrary to popular belief, success occurs thru hard work. Unsuccessful people are not sending their kids to private schools. No I did not say private students work harder. 

Not necessarily a private only advantage, but in many cases private feeder schools have multiple feeder K-8 schools. So the pool doesn't start getting weeded out until their freshman year, where schools with a single feeder MS start getting weeded out when they're in the 7th grade.

As has been mentioned, in most cases parents who send their kids to private schools are much more likely to hold their children accountable than their public school counterparts. The may also have the means for outside of school instruction, camps, etc. 

Legacy, again not necessarily a private school deal, but it seems a lot more prevalent there. Multiple generations who attend the same school. That creates a culture, Grandpa was on that 56 team that went undefeated, dad was on 85 championship team, and Junior and his teammates have that tradition to live up to. You hear constantly private schools talk about their culture, and it's necessarily aimed at sports, but sports do weigh heavily into it. 

Just some random thoughts off the top of my head. And just to be clear the tired old "they can recruit" thing is sooo played. EVERY SCHOOL in the state of Indiana recruits, lets move on. 

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I’ll take a bit of exception with your “programs don’t have success, kids do statement” as I believe that to be a partial truth but not an exact science.

OK, I agree that the program is not immaterial and that this isn't an exact science.  But the problem is that the success factor seems to rest on a presumption that the program is everything and the specific players -- those who had the success, those who come after -- are immaterial.

The truth is that every scenario is different.  My alma mater has been to 3 football state finals in a row, winning two.  In the first season of this run, however, our headlines were reading "Memorial tops Jasper for first time in 10 years" (I don't remember the exact number of years...but that's roughly right).  We had similar headlines when we beat (4A) Reitz and (2A) Mater Dei.  So a program who has double-digit year losing streaks to 3 different annual opponents is now success-factored?

As unfair as it is to chalk up the success of any team (especially in football, the ultimate team sport) to a handful of individuals, in our case it's almost certainly true.  You take away Lindauer and the Combs brothers from us, and I strongly doubt we have the run we've had recently.  But, while that era came to a close this weekend, our SF points have kept adding up.  The kids who got them have moved on and the ones behind them, many of whom had nothing to do with it, now have an ostensibly steeper path to tournament success.

3 hours ago, Temptation said:

I have always felt that the success factor is a bandage designed to keep public schools happy which it has done, in a small way.

I think most people see it that way, with reason.  As I recall, there was even some discussion about putting P/Ps in their own division.  But the SF system we have now is what they settled on.  But why should the IHSAA, or any similar institution, be making policy designed to keep certain members happy at the implied expense of certain other members?  If you want to have more success than you've had, take all the steps needed (within the rules, of course) to have more success.  But to implement rule changes to make things harder for those who are having success?

I wouldn't support any success factor policy, honestly.  But, if they're going to have one, then they need to have a policy that better distinguishes between true perennial powers and programs that just happened to hit paydirt with a class or two of studs.  I think the IFCA recommended a 4-year window to point up.  That, at least, seems to guard better against the latter scenario.

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59 minutes ago, Irishman said:

Soooooo, what you are saying is that the 1,000 or so kids at Dwenger is basically the same as the 1,000 or so at New Haven? Both are 4A schools......with the ONLY difference than the “traditional commitment and drive to win”??????? Seriously? Take one day to walk our halls, and I guarantee that impression will change in a heartbeat.

As others have said, committed parents make a HUGE difference, no doubt about it. What has been basically ignored, outside of a post or two, is the special needs population. Our building alone has about 10% of its population in that category. Very few of them are on diploma track. With certificate track kids in our building the absolute highest possible rate for graduation is at 92%. And there are a number of those kids that have minimal skills. The special education staff in our building makes up 25% of our staff. The new pathways to graduation our ingenious politicians came up with has forced even more lower functioning students into gen ed classes. In one class alone, I have close to half the class that are low functioning. Communication skills are the level of a 2 or 3 year old. I have others in that group that do not communicate at all, are confined to wheelchairs, wear a bib to catch the drool coming out of their mouths, or have other severe disabilities. It fits the schedules of the paras and nurses that have to accompany these students to have them in one period, but they make up 10% of my population for this semester. 
Now who wants to continue the conversation about the REAL differences? And who still actually thinks you are somehow being “punished” for success? When you want to have a REAL conversation about who gets punished for what when schools are classified, let me know. 

The lawmakers and IHSAA don't have equitability in mind, that is for sure.   

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Soooooo, what you are saying is that the 1,000 or so kids at Dwenger is basically the same as the 1,000 or so at New Haven? Both are 4A schools......with the ONLY difference than the “traditional commitment and drive to win”??????? Seriously? Take one day to walk our halls, and I guarantee that impression will change in a heartbeat.

Even if this is the case, I don't think it justifies the SF or any other rule designed to make sports success more difficult for Dwenger (or anybody else).  It's a really bad representation of how success, failure, etc. work in real life.  If somebody else is having more success than you are at whatever pursuit or endeavor you're undertaking, and this is something you can't abide, the answer to that should never be to throw whatever bombs you have at your disposal in their path.  That's not competition -- or, at least, it's not the way to deal with competition.  The benefit of competition is that it makes all competitors strive to be better -- not to try to seek equal (or more equal) results, however possible.

We shouldn't be teaching kids that the way to get the results they want in life is to take actions to hamper others who are seeking the same results, just because they're getting better ones.  Because, among other reasons, that's not how it's going to work for them when they enter the workforce.  If they want better results there, they're going to have to improve their own performance.

 

Quote

What has been basically ignored, outside of a post or two, is the special needs population.

I have a lot more sympathy for this argument.  But wouldn't that mean having to officially exclude these kids from competing in athletics?  It seems to me that would be a prerequisite for discounting them from the enrollment figures.  I don't think it's something you can have both ways -- "we're going to exclude special education students from our enrollment figures, except those who actually participate in athletics."  But, that issue aside, I do generally agree that it makes no sense to count them for the purpose of developing athletics classes.

 

Quote

And who still actually thinks you are somehow being “punished” for success?

Well, this might just be a semantics thing.  But, after all, schools that get enough points aren't moved down a class, right?  They're not pulling out a pair of dice and rolling it to see which class they'll compete in in succeeding years, right?  The entire idea is to pit those schools against stiffer competition -- which is another way of saying that they should have a harder time getting through tournaments.  I guess we can debate whether or not "punishment" is the right word to describe this, but it certainly doesn't seem like any kind of reward.

That said, whether or not it's a "punishment" isn't really my beef with it.  My beef with it is that the SF burden is almost always placed on people who weren't responsible for the success.  That makes no sense at all.

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1 hour ago, Irishman said:

I agree that the open enrollment thing is a joke. But what we see is that those who do transfer are not transferring for athletics so much as they are thinking they can avoid a level of discipline if they stay. We have students who have enrolled the last week or so, who were told if you transfer, we will not expel you......

Soooooo, what you are saying is that the 1,000 or so kids at Dwenger is basically the same as the 1,000 or so at New Haven? Both are 4A schools......with the ONLY difference than the “traditional commitment and drive to win”??????? Seriously? Take one day to walk our halls, and I guarantee that impression will change in a heartbeat.

As others have said, committed parents make a HUGE difference, no doubt about it. What has been basically ignored, outside of a post or two, is the special needs population. Our building alone has about 10% of its population in that category. Very few of them are on diploma track. With certificate track kids in our building the absolute highest possible rate for graduation is at 92%. And there are a number of those kids that have minimal skills. The special education staff in our building makes up 25% of our staff. The new pathways to graduation our ingenious politicians came up with has forced even more lower functioning students into gen ed classes. In one class alone, I have close to half the class that are low functioning. Communication skills are the level of a 2 or 3 year old. I have others in that group that do not communicate at all, are confined to wheelchairs, wear a bib to catch the drool coming out of their mouths, or have other severe disabilities. It fits the schedules of the paras and nurses that have to accompany these students to have them in one period, but they make up 10% of my population for this semester. 
Now who wants to continue the conversation about the REAL differences? And who still actually thinks you are somehow being “punished” for success? When you want to have a REAL conversation about who gets punished for what when schools are classified, let me know. 

If the participation level is 35% to 70%, move a school down in enrollment.  The truth is, FW South Side is never going to compete in anything in 4A as things stand.   The problem, however, will become when they do win in a lower class, the athletes around town will flock to that school immediately.   They will then be in a Division where they dominate and are a larger school.  

There is also the issue where Carmel and virtually every Indianapolis area school doubles the size of a few other 6A schools outside of Indy.  For some reason, nobody cares about that.  Gee, I wonder why?   Do you know which school didn’t whine and moan about Carmel and other Indy schools size?  New Palestine   They just got better   If you want to win, you have to commit and a made up rule that was created to give someone fairness isn’t living in reality   

For the record, I don’t care if Carmel is that big,  it will be nice that they will have to come through the South next year. 

The bottom line is this, there is not a perfect system.  The schools with the resources, public and private, that want to win find a way. The schools mentioned that have a hard time getting kids to come out for athletics have much deeper problems that have nothing to do with athletics.  The success factor rule won’t have anything to do with whether or not these schools change OR if they win State in football.   

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7 minutes ago, OldschoolFB said:

If the participation level is 35% to 70%, move a school down in enrollment.  The truth is, FW South Side is never going to compete in anything in 4A as things stand.   The problem, however, will become when they do win in a lower class, the athletes around town will flock to that school immediately.   They will then be in a Division where they dominate and are a larger school.  

There is also the issue where Carmel and virtually every Indianapolis area school doubles the size of a few other 6A schools outside of Indy.  For some reason, nobody cares about that.  Gee, I wonder why?   Do you know which school didn’t whine and moan about Carmel and other Indy schools size?  New Palestine   They just got better   If you want to win, you have to commit and a made up rule that was created to give someone fairness isn’t living in reality   

For the record, I don’t care if Carmel is that big,  it will be nice that they will have to come through the South next year. 

The bottom line is this, there is not a perfect system.  The schools with the resources, public and private, that want to win find a way. The schools mentioned that have a hard time getting kids to come out for athletics have much deeper problems that have nothing to do with athletics.  The success factor rule won’t have anything to do with whether or not these schools change OR if they win State in football.   

I don’t disagree with anything you have said here, but my post isn’t about the kids that won’t participate because there are plenty of those, as much as it is about the kids who physically and/or mentally cannot. I agree that the success factor does nothing for many schools, even if a team in the sectional or regional they are in moves up. But you have to admit, it is difficult to complain about the success factor when a number of teams made deep runs in the tournament, including getting to the State title game, and a couple of them even winning a State title. That would indicate more that this is actually working to have those teams on a level that matches the population in their building as far as the number of kids who are actually participating and have the resources invested in the program to compete. 

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1 hour ago, Jbk2 said:

One advantage I see for private schools is that they can say who is in or who is out. They can control their numbers to stay in a certain class unless the success factor is in play. A public school can cap but they also have to let everyone attend that's in the district.

I personally think this is the biggest misconception. Yes they can say who is in and who is out. They can and do control their enrollment numbers but it is not to stay in 3A instead of 4A, 2A instead of 3A, 1A instead of 2A. They control their enrollment because of the space that they have to hold the students. Some of these schools just don't have the room for students beyond what their enrollment currently is. The building can't hold more than what their current enrollment is. Some have added to their school building and you see their enrollment grow because of it. Others have not. The decision to control the number of students to stay in a certain classification doesn't even cross the minds of the administration. What is on their mind is classroom sizes and number of teachers for the students enrolled/enrolling. If you look at the schools I think you will see they are pretty much at the max of what the school can take.

Now I will 100% agree with the points @Irishman is making about the make up of the student bodies. I just feel some totally miss the point of why these schools control their enrollment and it has nothing to do with what sports classification they will be in. It should also be pointed out that when it comes to Private schools they recruit every student that comes into the door be it a football athlete, member of the band or Orchestra, or a student that competes in no sports at all. They recruit the students simply because if they didn't they wouldn't be able to keep the school open. The schools mentioned aren't just great at sports, they do well in the academic field also.

 

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1 hour ago, Titan32 said:

OK dusting this off from the 3A thread:

 

We all know that with 10k-15k a year in Indy (6K in Evansville) for tuition at a P&P by default the "quality" of student-athlete is generally going to be "higher", for lack of a better word, than the equivalent sized public.  Take for example a GS or HH who probably has some of the lowest free and assisted lunch in the state by percentage of the student body in 3A for publics.  Even with that, GS and HH simply won't have the same number of quality student-athletes walking the halls as their p&p counterparts by the percentage of enrollment (with the exception of some generational aboratinon).  Anyone who denies that is simply hiding their head in the sand.  I can tell you that we have kids at GS (ie part of our enrollment numbers) who are only there because they have a pulse and the law says that they have to be (and we have much less than most other publics our size) not to mention the kids in life-skills based classes.  Again, "generally", folks who can make the sacrifice to send their kids to a P&P have certain qualities in common that I don't need to list here that are both "natured" and "nurtured" into their kids.  

Does this quality "stock" always result in a strong tradition in any sport?  Certainly not, however, when the key variables are in place, the same variables that it takes to have success at a public in a given sport...ie, community, youth league, parent support, coaching etc., those variables are multiplied by a factor "x" across a deeper bench so to speak.

As I have mentioned before, as a case study in the SIAC,  Memorial vs Castle.  This P&P typically runs head to head with its public rival in terms of conference championships boys and girls.  This would indicate both schools have a similar bench depth across a wide variety of sports, boys, and girls.  Castle enrollment 1965,  Memorial enrollment 609.  Castle isn't exactly a district of struggling families.  Some pretty easy math even for a public educated kid can see the disparity here in the ratio there of total enrollment to quality student-athlete.  You see this all over the state.  What does it mean?  Does Memorial have better coaches?  Do memorial kids have a better work ethic?  Is it that the early poor immigrant Catholics into Southwestern Indiana were blue-collared people that instilled an incredible physical culture and work ethic over generations significantly impacting their ability to succeed in girls soccer?

There clearly are some public representatives on the GID that are advocates of "everything is fine" or perhaps that are even against the success factor.  Many of those seem to fall into one of a few buckets:  Those who have advanced in the state tournament over a p&p at some point in school history or public's that are geographically aligned in such a way that they get quality imports or perhaps in such a way that P&Ps aren't an issue in their path.  There will always be a subset with a certain machismo or the "put your head down and go to work" mentality that simply won't admit the above paradigm is simply a fact.  That is the nature of our sport and I wouldn't' change that for the world.  Those folks know it's true but the  "football guy" in them simply won't let admit that there are certain inherent advantages.  Reasonable, intelligent men and women can't debate on if a solution is necessary, if the one we have is adequate or if additional measures are needed at all.   I simply can't wrap my head around how any reasonable person on either side of these arguments can say P&Ps and public are equitably measured by enrollment alone.  Just simply say....sure they have advantages...but I don't care...I like the challenge.  That I can accept.

The enduring success that GS has had -- particularly since Nick Hart was hired -- is as good an example as I can point to why something like the SF is not only not good, but also not needed.

GS is a smallish, rural public high school.  Around 700 students from an area that is neither rich nor poor.  It's not Carmel or Zionsville, but it's also not East Chicago.  But the school not only has great facilities, it also has a very strong feeder program.  I've had conversations with a number of GS people about it -- including one of the coaches.  Coach Hart and the other members of the staff -- along with the administration, parents, and boosters -- have all done a phenomenal job putting together a top notch football program.  Some years they have the horses to play with anybody, other years they're a bit down.  Right now, you guys have a QB who will end up a 4-year starter and a sky-high potential.  It's entirely conceivable that Allen will lead GS to LOS at least once, if not twice.

But does that really mean that the kids coming up behind him, once he's gone, should be put on a steeper path?  I don't think so.  And, for me, it doesn't have anything to do with P/P versus public, or rich vs. poor, or anything like that.  It has to do with common sense and logic -- plus a general belief that HS (athletics and otherwise) should properly prepare kids to compete in the workforce and policies like this work counter to that goal.

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1 hour ago, OldschoolFB said:

Do you know which school didn’t whine and moan about Carmel and other Indy schools size?  New Palestine   They just got better   If you want to win, you have to commit and a made up rule that was created to give someone fairness isn’t living in reality

I couldn't agree more.  The whole thing has a very "participation trophy" feel to it.  And, frankly, I think that's one of the fundamentally wrong turns we've taken as a society.  It was taken in the interest of promoting "success" by trying to eliminate (or, at least, diminish) the prospect of failure -- and it accomplishes this by making success harder for others to achieve.

Imagine if, say, a commissioned sales force worked this way.  We've got a team of 2 sales reps -- Joe and Bob -- and they each start out with an annual quota of $1 million.  After a couple years in, both reps are making quota.  But Joe is pushing $3 million in sales, while Bob is just getting beyond the $1 million quota.  How much sense would it make to increase Joe's quota to the $3 million mark, while leaving Bob's alone?  No matter what you might do with compensation, you'd still be telling your better rep that, because he's proven capable of selling more than the weaker rep, he's going to have to triple that guy just to keep his job....while the other guy can sell a third as much and still keep his.

This isn't how the world works -- nor should it be.  And to call it "fair" is positively Orwellian.

Edited by MHSTigerFan
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51 minutes ago, MHSTigerFan said:

The enduring success that GS has had -- particularly since Nick Hart was hired -- is as good an example as I can point to why something like the SF is not only not good, but also not needed.

GS is a smallish, rural public high school.  Around 700 students from an area that is neither rich nor poor.  It's not Carmel or Zionsville, but it's also not East Chicago.  But the school not only has great facilities, it also has a very strong feeder program.  I've had conversations with a number of GS people about it -- including one of the coaches.  Coach Hart and the other members of the staff -- along with the administration, parents, and boosters -- have all done a phenomenal job putting together a top notch football program.  Some years they have the horses to play with anybody, other years they're a bit down.  Right now, you guys have a QB who will end up a 4-year starter and a sky-high potential.  It's entirely conceivable that Allen will lead GS to LOS at least once, if not twice.

But does that really mean that the kids coming up behind him, once he's gone, should be put on a steeper path?  I don't think so.  And, for me, it doesn't have anything to do with P/P versus public, or rich vs. poor, or anything like that.  It has to do with common sense and logic -- plus a general belief that HS (athletics and otherwise) should properly prepare kids to compete in the workforce and policies like this work counter to that goal.

I know just a little bit on how we were/are constructed :).  Keep in mind that when you read my response above, it isn't an argument for the SF.   It is an argument that P/Ps have certain undeniable advantages and that enrollment alone is a horrible way to try to classify institutions that operate so differently.

Edited by Titan32
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