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Find more Kappan articles in the A Sane Island Surrounded Interscholastic sports programs in the U.S. face increasing pressures from the pervasiveness of sport in American life. How can school sports programs stave off the negative effects of the combined pressure of commercialism and professionalism? Mr. Roberts details Michigan's approach. THE HEADLINE for the cover story of the sports section of USA Today on 9 February 2007 asked: "Do prep basketball teams go too far?" Underneath, a one-sentence summary read: "Long-distance trips, whirlwind schedules mean missed class time but more TV exposure, money." The story recounted six days in which the boys' basketball team of Lakewood Artesia High School of California played five games, including one game in North Carolina. Over the years and across the nation, administrators of school sports programs have wrung their hands in worry and frustration over this sort of thing, which they believe is an example of the damage being done to interscholastic athletic programs by major college and professional sports, combined with nonschool sports programs for young people. However, all of these outside influences combined have not been as damaging to interscholastic athletics as the too frequent lack of creativity and courage on the part of those who are actually in charge of these programs. A combination of commercialism and professionalism has become a powerful force undermining the wholesome nature of amateur athletic programs in the local secondary schools of America. Meanwhile, those of us responsible for promoting the proper principles of school sports and protecting them from blatant attacks and insidious erosion have, for the most part, put up a pitiful defense. In some cases, we have simply retreated in full gallop. And we have gotten what our feeble efforts have deserved. But the seductions of commercialism and professionalism in scholastic sports were not created in a vacuum. The growth in popularity of professional sports in America parallels -- in fact, has been primarily powered by -- the introduction of television, and it has been the pervasive influence of television on American life that has driven content-starved networks to televise all kinds of sports, every day of the week, at all hours of the day. And this constant bombardment of the public psyche by a commercialized and professionalized version of sport has had its effect, first on college sports and, more recently, on scholastic sports. Numerous books have documented how and why men's basketball and football at the Division I level of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) have been seduced toward commercialism and professionalism.1 The seduction of scholastic sports in the same direction is less spectacular and has been the subject of fewer books.2 In recent decades, school sports programs have found themselves under assault not just from the levels of sports above (major college and professional sports), but also from those below: nonschool community youth sports programs. The Amateur Sports Act of 1978 removed the stranglehold of the Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) on the U.S. Olympic Committee and the participation by U.S. athletes in international sports. The law empowered newly created individual sports federations, in sports ranging from basketball to gymnastics to soccer, to organize and to some degree to regulate a sport from top to bottom, except for the programs of schools and colleges. The growth of these programs eventually led to a proliferation of youth sports camps, leagues, and tournaments across a wide range of sports. These generally well-intentioned single-sport organizations understandably see the world almost exclusively from the viewpoint of their own sport. Over the years, these organizations have pushed athletes toward competition at ever earlier ages and in ever longer seasons. One unintended consequence is that, with rare exceptions, their calendars -- if not their codes -- have promoted specialization in a single sport year-round. Another unintended consequence of the 1978 legislation is that the AAU, no longer able to serve the international interests of dozens of sports, lowered its sights and aimed its efforts inward: not just to grassroots youth sports organizations, but also to leagues, camps, and tournaments for basketball teams for players aged 8 to 18. For the older athletes, there are the perks of national travel and tournaments, huge trophies, and lots of gifts. And not so infrequently, the inducement to play for a certain AAU team as a means to obtaining scholarships at particular colleges or endorsement deals with particular commercial organizations. To say that amateur basketball is out of control in the United States is to say that New Orleans had a high tide in August 2005. The AAU is a loosely constituted network of volunteers and is thus ill equipped to make and enforce reasonable schedules or standards of eligibility and amateurism for either its players or its club coaches. Clearly, against the backdrop of amateur sports, with its increasing revenues and promotion, the challenges facing scholastic sports have been huge. The sane island of school sports is today surrounded by rough waters made even more treacherous by sharks of the most unsavory character. And the response of those in charge of school sports has not been up to the challenges. One member of the staff I work with has often reminded the rest of us that the problems of the sports culture today did not arise overnight. They have crept in by way of a series of small decisions -- or inactions -- that seemed almost harmless. This series of incremental changes has nurtured the seeds of calamitous change in interscholastic athletics. Over the years and across the nation, state high school association rules were modified to permit increased participation, longer seasons, more travel, and a greater number of awards in school sports. In some cases, courts ordered the changes, but even in those cases, the associations sometimes caved in without a fight or failed to exhaust appellate review in an effort to preserve the principle that voluntary associations of schools have the privilege of democratically determining, without judicial interference, the policies and procedures that govern voluntary, competitive, extracurricular interscholastic athletics for which no right of participation exists. At the national level, the National Federation of State High School Associations relaxed its oversight process for approving interstate competition, gradually increasing the number of schools that could participate in interstate tournaments without the Federation's approval. This change has led to larger and longer interstate tournaments. The Federation also relaxed its mileage limitation for approval of interstate competition, which gradually led to tournaments on an ever grander scale. For nearly three decades, the National Federation has undercut the policies of its membership by flirting with concepts for national promotions and even national high school championships. Had the Federation leadership quoted its own policies and consistently said bluntly to commercial interests that "our membership doesn't support and we won't be involved in national athletic events," the message would have been clear. Instead, the national leadership cooperated with those who brought forth such promotions and conveyed an equivocal message: "We would do this, but our membership does not approve." Not surprisingly, more and more proposals were put forward. In 2003, for the sum of a million dollars, the National Federation endorsed a national high school cheerleading championship. In doing so, the leadership explained lamely that, while existing policy prohibits its involvement in national sporting events, cheerleading isn't considered a sport everywhere. This explanation conveniently overlooked the National Federation's own Handbook, which refers to cheerleading as a sport. Apparently emboldened by this "success," the National Federation lent its name to a national invitational basketball tournament in December 2006, joining the dozens of such events being sponsored at the same time of year. In exchange for several million dollars, the Federation's board of directors changed its strategic plan -- approved just a few months earlier -- so that the Federation could be involved in such activities. The circumstances surrounding competitive sports in America, on other levels and with other sponsors, should have offered compelling evidence to the Federation's board that it is extraordinarily difficult, if not impossible, to avoid doing harm to the primary mission of schools when the stakes of extracurricular athletic competition are raised. Indeed, it seems unreasonable for interscholastic athletic administrators to argue that we can conduct national high school tournaments without experiencing the kinds of problems that have plagued national intercollegiate tournaments. Those who operate university programs, at least in Division I men's basketball and football, have often failed to fit these athletic programs within the educational mission of their institutions. Exorbitant coaching salaries, extravagant practice and competition facilities, extended time away from campuses and classes, and exploitation by television any day of the week, any time of the day or night, have distanced intercollegiate athletics from the primary mission of the sponsoring institutions. The same fate awaits scholastic sports. During my career in scholastic sports, I have observed four leaders of the NCAA: Walter Byers, Richard Schultz, Cedric Dempsey, and Myles Brand. All four are men of outstanding character and ability. I worked closely with Byers and regard him as the quickest mind I've met in all of sports, and I consider Brand's dismissal of a legendary head basketball coach at the university over which he presided to be one of the most appropriate yet courageous acts of athletic administration by a university president in recent history. But even these great minds and managers and the great leaders of college conferences and institutions have been unable to keep intercollegiate athletics from drifting away from the mission of higher education and toward commercialism -- and with it, corruption. In his "State of the Association" speech to the NCAA membership on 6 January 2007, Myles Brand said, "Intercollegiate athletics is a success story." And certainly there have been successes. But the topic of his speech was really reform, and reform means there have been problems. The introduction to the speech used the word "reform" four times. "The NCAA has been engaged in academic reform of one kind or another for many decades," he said. Good grief! Decades? Does this not suggest a systemic problem? Does this not suggest that it is impossible to raise the stakes of intercollegiate athletics as high as college institutions have allowed and not encounter insolvable problems? Some will say that, while they would never agree to a national high school basketball championship, they can't see what could be wrong with a national high school championship in golf or tennis or other sports whose championships would be held during the summer months. Their naiveté fails to look down the road and around the corner. Just as cheerleading led the National Federation to basketball, and a four-team tournament will lead to eight and then to 16 teams, a national high school tournament in golf and tennis in the summer will lead to a national tournament for basketball during the school year. The response to such ideas is an emphatic "No," issued immediately and repeatedly. National events may promote the name of a national organization and its sponsors, but they are at best neutral -- and more likely harmful -- toward the fabric of school sports in America. The promotion and administration of national tournaments will distract attention and resources away from the broad and deep local school programs and focus effort on single teams in a few communities. At national meetings in January 2007, once again the leaders of state and national high school associations complained of all the large, national in-season tournaments, especially in basketball, but also in other sports. They talked of the exorbitant costs of these events to local schools and of the exploitation of schools by tournament sponsors. They talked of inducements to coaches to accept invitations to bring their teams to particular tournaments. Such discussions always occur in an atmosphere of resignation, with the tacit acceptance that there is nothing to be done about it. Solutions Within Our Means But I do not accept that dispiriting conclusion. In 2002 and 2003, when the LeBron James circus was playing in Ohio high school athletics, it was close enough to Michigan for questions to be asked and contrasts to be drawn. I offer the following examples of Michigan policies that blunt the impact of commercialism and professionalism in school sports. 1. Travel limitations. Unlike Ohio, Michigan has maintained a mileage limitation for interstate competition that once was common to all states and enforced through the National Federation's sanctioning program. For interstate competition beyond bordering states, Michigan schools may not travel more than 600 miles round trip, nor may Michigan schools compete in any competition in which any participating school has traveled in excess of that distance. There are no exceptions to this mileage limitation for basketball, for the impact of such exceptions in other states has been to erode -- and eventually erase -- the rule altogether. In other words, Michigan schools simply do not play in national-scope tournaments, whether those events are far away or in our own backyard. Such a rule is about more than simply minimizing the travel time and the cost to schools. It also seeks to promote the view that local competition, both at the subvarsity and varsity levels, is of primary value. It is the cross-town, not cross-country, trip that is the driving force of school sports. No school is above this policy. School record, rank, and reputation do not trump the rule. In fact, the mileage limitation is designed for, and intended to be applied especially to, the higher-profile programs. Indeed, it is not a rule that most schools need, but it serves its purpose when a promoter eyes some adolescent star and seeks to exploit that student or the interscholastic program generally. Michigan rules state emphatically: "The membership of the Michigan High School Athletic Association [MHSAA] is opposed to all-star events and national championships and urges its member schools and their personnel and booster clubs to have no involvement with such events at any time." No one doubts where Michigan stands. 2. Compensation for coaches. Michigan schools have for years enforced limits on coaches' compensation. The profile of high school coaches is enlarged by media attention and player adulation. Thus it has become common practice among tournament promoters to provide special incentives to high-profile teams or to the coaches of teams with hotshot players in the college recruiting battle. Event organizers go to great lengths to lure these attractions to their camps or competitions. Michigan's school rules prohibit such practices with the following policies:
3. Restrictions on telecasts. For as long as Michigan schools have had limitations on team travel and coaches' compensation, they've had restrictions on live telecasts of regular-season contests. The principal purpose of these restrictions has been to protect the gate for member schools, so that they do not have to compete with a live telecast involving a high-profile team that might encourage people to stay at home rather than attend a local school event. The restrictions have expanded as technology has developed additional ways to transmit live images of competition. Currently, the rules state:
Policies in Other States Michigan educators are not alone in their belief that stricter policies at the high school level can insulate interscholastic athletics from some of the sicknesses infecting sports in America. • The Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association is floating the idea of increasing the number of basketball games that may be played by teams that play no out-of-state games, while freezing the number of games for teams that include an out-of-state trip on their schedule. • In Iowa, the boys' state high school athletic association will extend its multi-team tournament approval process to dual competition at multi-team "shootouts" in order to help avoid appearance fees and violations of rules governing awards and amateur status. It also applies its 300-mile travel limit to both its member schools and their out-of-state opponents. No national-scope competition is allowed. • Several other high school athletic associations, especially in the nation's midsection, continue to limit the distance their member schools may travel for interstate competition or the frequency or duration of such trips. Policies that restrict interstate travel, prohibit national tournaments, ban inducements and results-based compensation to coaches, and keep television from interfering with local school programs have all proven to be effective and have helped avoid many of the problems that tear the fabric of school sports in other places. None of these restrictions cost money, but all of them require a serious commitment to protect and promote the core values of school sports. School sports programs fill a niche in the lives of kids and communities and in the world of sports. Their benefits are widely acknowledged. By copying the excesses of sports on other levels, we risk losing them all. 1. Among the books that track the increasing commercialism and professionalism of revenue-producing college sports are: Rick Telander, The Hundred Yard Lie: The Corruption of College Football and What We Can Do to Stop It (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1989); Murray Sperber, Beer and Circus: How Big Time Sports Is Crippling Undergraduate Education (New York: Henry Holt, 2000); and William G. Bowen and Sarah A. Levin, Reclaiming the Game: College Sports and Educational Values (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2003). 2. Among the books that track the increasing commercialism and professionalism of scholastic sports are: Andrew W. Miracle and C. Rogers Rees, Lessons of the Locker Room: The Myth of School Sports (Amherst, N.Y.: Prometheus Books, 1994); H. G. Bissinger, Friday Night Lights: A Town, a Team, and a Dream (Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley, 1990); and Dan Wetzel and Don Yaeger, Sole Influence: Basketball, Corporate Greed, and the Corruption of America's Youth (New York: Warner Books, 2000). JACK ROBERTS is executive director of the Michigan High School Athletic Association, East Lansing. |
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