Garrigan was the 8 man team I mentioned. Had over 50 kids on their roster last year. Seems maybe they should go 11
Iowa High School BEDS count 24-25
- Thread starter qwerty
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AAU started that slide. Seen it in teams where the AAU girls would bully and shred the non AAU girls and chase them off. Then were confused when only a couple girls from their class were still playing by their junior years.
PC would like to get into the SCC but they don’t want them.
A private school stocked with athletes... weird.
Oh I'm fully aware. Garrigan and Don Bosco are the only 8 man teams with those kind of numbers.
The state needs to either divide 8 man into big and small schools or force some schools up to class A. Stated before the state could solve all of these problems by going away from the BEDS count and use the actual size of the roster over a 5 year period to determine the class of the school.
In 1969 St. Edmond was in Class 2A and finished 4th in the state BB tournament competing with the big boys
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Yeah if a team has that many participants they absolutely should not be playing 8 man. Who gives AF what the bed count is, especially with the private schools.
I think BEDS with a +1 for privates would be better.
Giving a benefit to a team for cutting or weeding out players seems like a bad idea. A moving average like mentioned above would certainly help, but I would guarantee there are coaches out there that would gladly cut or weed out their roster from 80 to 60 to drop a class. Maybe I'm wrong.
There's no great solution, but privates +1 is an improvement, and is maybe good enough.
Yeah and we are going to start seeing more of this as more and more private charter schools come on line...The IHSAA is going to have to make some changes.
There is no such thing as a ‘private charter school’ in iowa. Charter schools are public schools with their own management. I don’t think a single one has separate athletics.
I really doubt that schools would cut 10/20 players, but private schools should be moved up a class from where their BEDS numbers would place them. In 8 man you have schools with 40 kids playing schools with 15 kids out for the sport.
The Iowa Boys Athletic Asso, really could care less about this issue, and they refuse to look at a +1 solution for private schools. Same problems just a different year.
Superintendents wouldn’t want to cut, but coaches may find a way to.
What coach is going to go out and cut 10/20 players to move down a class? You do that you better win, because you are going to cause a **** storm of people in the community after you.
Using rosters would be over a 4/5 year span to determine the classification number, so you are going to have to cut players for multiple years to get down low enough to drop a class.
I know at least two that would. And I know at least two people that served on school boards would support the coach. And I know one short sighted school district that had the opportunity to share a sport with a neighboring school and refused because it would move them up a class. And it cost them a state track championship, even if they went up a class. Your school benefited and won state.
It's pretty easy to weed kids out or put them in a bind without cutting. Example my kid experienced - FB coach says they want multi-sport kids. Then schedules summer workouts in a way that they almost all conflict with in-season baseball activities, and says they aren't required but if you see yourself playing varsity you need to make at least 3 per week.
I'm biased because my coach in HS is my FIL, but we had ridiculous participation rates because it was a great and positive environment for kids. Kids were built up. Bullying, hazing, intimidation of younger/smaller kids was actively addressed and was squashed before it ever became a problem. Coaches never berated kids. Coaches were almost never yelled or were negative at all. If kids worked hard and stuck with it by the time they were Srs almost no matter what they found some role for them on the field. Doing the right thing led to roster sizes that were way above what they should've been in terms of enrollment.
Even if few would do it, creating a disincentive to encouraging participation is a bad thing. Sometimes it's socioeconomics. They are trying to at least somewhat address this reason. Sometimes it's just years of losing. But a lot of times schools have lower participation rates than their peer schools because it's a bad environment. It seems like there's a potential for rewarding the wrong behavior.
The object should be for schools to hire coaches who can motivate kids to come out.
Brooklyn Gernsey Malcom has 142 in the bed count. Bigger than a lot of Class A schools from the looks of that list. Looked up their roster on Bound. Almost 40 players. How are they in 8-man?
Free/Reduced lunch numbers are probably pretty big in a community like that.
There is a multiplier there.
