Shrinking Economy Penalizes High School Sports

Budget cuts are forcing parents in more communities, although not all, to fund athletics.

By SCOTT MARTINDALE, The Orange County Register

If parents in the Saddleback Valley Unified School District want assistant coaches for sports programs this fall, the families will need to pony up the cash themselves. The 34,000-student district has cut the positions from its high schools – along with all funding for roller hockey and lacrosse – as a cost-savings measure.

Conversely, athletic programs at the county's largest school district, Santa Ana Unified, will remain almost untouched. Parents won't be asked to subsidize the cost of bus transportation to away games, and won't need to raise funds to pay for basics like equipment and uniforms. The biggest fear right now is the possible loss of athletic secretaries this fall, but a final decision hasn't been made.

As high schools cope with drastic funding shortfalls, they've been forced to make tough budget decisions about athletics and other extracurricular programs, widening the disparity of sports offerings – and funding available – in Orange County's diverse communities.

"It's really a question of priorities that school districts have to make," said Chris Corliss, the Orange County Department of Education's program coordinator for health, sports and physical education services.

"High school sports are an integral part of the high school experience, but it's nothing that's mandated," Corliss said. "I would predict some significant belt-tightening in the next few years. Coaches will be lost. Parents will be asked for more in the very near future, whether through fundraising or direct contributions."

While districts like Santa Ana Unified have avoided deep cuts to sports programs so far – the district's high proportion of socioeconomically disadvantaged families wouldn't be able to help subsidize sports – many other local districts have been forced to scale back their athletic offerings.

In response, booster groups increasingly are being tapped to raise funds and, at times, beg and cajole parents into writing checks for hundreds of dollars per season, per athlete, per sport.
Mission Viejo parent Linda Robert, who helps head up fundraising efforts for Trabuco Hills High School's roller hockey team, says that with the loss of all Saddleback Valley Unified financial support, the team must now come up with about an additional $3,400 a year. That's on top of the $1,000 or more that parents individually pay to outfit their children with expensive gear and equipment, she said.

"We sell food, do garage sales, restaurant benefit nights, as many fundraisers as we can do," said Robert, who has an incoming freshman hockey player and an older hockey player who graduated this year. "We tell parents going in, 'This is how much we need to raise, and if we don't, you are going to have to make up the difference.'"

SHRINKING PROGRAMS

Across California, high schools are paring coaching staffs, wiping out or combining lower-level teams such as freshmen and frosh-soph, requiring parents to pay for bus transportation, and cutting down the number of away games each season, officials say. In the Garden Grove Unified School District, officials are planning to cut up to two games per season from some sports beginning this fall, said Frank Alvarado, a board member of the Orange County Athletic Directors Association.

Public schools can't force parents to pay for sports – the California Supreme Court made that clear in a 1984 ruling – but there's no law that says school districts must offer sports programs.
There's also nothing to stop parents and student athletes from seeking out donations and sponsorships wherever they can, although the sour economy is making it an increasingly difficult feat.

"Parents are being hammered with so many other things at school that sometimes they say, 'No, I don't want to raise the money,'" said Rossmoor parent Larry Strawther, who publishes a popular sports-focused e-mail newsletter on Los Alamitos High School athletics. "Merchants are being hit hard by so many different entities," he added. "The level of donations is going down and is harder to find, as the cost of sports is going up."

In the past few years, the size of the printed program for Los Alamitos High's boys basketball team – an annual publication that includes player rosters and game schedules – has been cut in half, Strawther said, primarily because local businesses have pulled out their ads. What was once 80 to 90 pages now is now 44 pages and shrinking.

FINANCIAL HARDSHIPS

The pressure on athletic booster groups also is increasing as parents lose their jobs and can no longer write a check to cover the cost of the sport, much less keep their own child fully outfitted in expensive gear.

When a student can't afford to participate, other parents inevitably step in and help pick up the tab, booster groups say. "We all know our school doesn't have the money, especially in today's economy," said Penny Sales, president of La Habra High School's football booster group. "We're a championship program, and if we want to stay a championship program, we just know we're going to have to do more fundraising." Some parents are keeping their children out of sports altogether because of the cost, officials say, or are forcing them to pick one sport per year or per season.

Rancho Santa Margarita parent Angie Hunt told her 14-year-old son, Adam, that he couldn't play both football and roller hockey at Trabuco Hills High this fall. "My son would have done both, but we didn't have the money, so he had to choose one or the other," said Hunt, whose son will be a freshman. "It's sad; the cost limits their choices."

At nearby Mission Viejo High School, where funding for all assistant coaches has been eliminated, school athletic director Troy Roelen said he expects to lose about 20 of his 95 coaches this fall. The remainder of his coaching staff will do double duty.

"I told my coaching staff we are thin and we need to make do," said Roelen, an English teacher at the school. "I've talked to parents and they agree to make it work. But at the current rate, if the cost of athletics keeps going up, we're going to start losing students."

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June 30, 2009 - The first generation to grow up digital is online nearly all the time.

According to the “Teen Advertising Study” by Fuse Marketing and the University of Massachusetts Amherst, 45% of US teen Internet users were heavy users of the Web.

Thirty-eight percent characterized themselves as average users, and 16% were light users. Teen Web users were active users of online media—90% used e-mail, 83% watched online video and 72% were social networkers. Authors of the survey wrote that the most effective ad content for reaching teens had “people like me enjoying the product” and humor.

Scholastic Programs Are Feeling the Pinch as Financing for Sports Dries Up

MIAMI (AP) — Tyler Peters has wrapped up his high school athletic career. Now he can only feel sympathy for his friends who are underclassmen at Coral Gables Senior High.

Across the country this spring, the recession has taken its toll on high school athletic programs. As states and school districts have tried to shore up their budgets, Florida has taken some of the most drastic steps.

The Florida High School Athletic Association is considering sweeping, two-year schedule changes with all sports except football canceling some matches, meets or games. The changes were approved earlier this year, but officials backed off the plan, saying they would take it up again at a later date.

A swimmer in high school, the 18-year-old Peters said he might have given it up if his season had been cut down.

“If I had three or four meets a year — the season’s so short,” Peters said. “It kind of seems like you’re doing that for nothing. That’s a part of the experience. If you take those competitions away, you feel like you’re practicing for something less important.”

When the fall season starts, many young athletes will feel the effects of cost-cutting measures.
A high school football coach in Washington said he would have tattered uniforms patched instead of requesting new jerseys. A Virginia school district is exploring transportation plans in which teams would share buses. And throughout California, which faces a grim financial situation, districts are bracing for cuts that could devastate entire programs.

“Help,” said Marie Ishida, executive director of the California Interscholastic Federation. “It could be dire.”

Bob Kanaby, executive director of the National Federation of State High School Associations, said a handful of other states had also made across-the-board changes to help districts cope with the financial climate. For example, New York has shortened its sports schedules, and in Maine, fewer schools will be allowed to compete in the state playoffs.

“Certainly in these economic times, we want to try and draw balance and perspective between educational experiences for young people and the realization that our nation is in a serious economic situation,” Kanaby said. “So there is concern, and there is action being done.“ He added: “But first and foremost, I think across the board that whatever occurs within a school district of a state that it’s very clear that these are things that are affecting the lives of young people, and people will do whatever they can to minimize that effect as much as possible.”

Since the economy tumbled, programs have found themselves on the chopping block and districts are asking students to chip in and help cover the costs.

Some examples:

• In California, some high schools have eliminated coaching stipends and decided they will ask students and parents to contribute donations.


• Officials with the Kent (Wash.) School District, located about 30 minutes outside Seattle, will cut $110,000 in athletic funding, said district athletic director Dave Lutes. That’s still an improvement from the original proposal of $760,000 in reductions, which Lutes said would have devastated the program.


• Some high school coaches at Mohawk High School in Oregon worked without pay this spring. A baseball coach at another program in the state, McKenzie High School, put his salary in a bank account and said he would donate it back to the school if necessary.


• Because of statewide financing cuts, Santa Fe (N.M.) Public Schools were considering switching middle school athletic programs to a club-team format. Those changes were eventually rejected, the district spokeswoman Erica J. Landry said, but officials cut two high school athletic managers for a savings of about $160,000 to $180,000 a year. Even with those staff reductions, Landry said athletic programs might be on the chopping block again next year.

“The problem is that you don’t have the money,” said Dan Domenech, executive director of the American Association of School Administrators. “And if you don’t have the money, you have to make tough choices. That’s what I think is really unfortunate about this. The resources just aren’t there and we don’t know what the effects are going to be.”

For some young athletes, the situation could have been even worse.

When officials in Maine mulled dropping a meet that the runners and their coaches had long fought to include on their schedule, Melody Lam, a 17-year-old distance runner at Mt. Blue High School, helped organize a protest before an indoor meet in January at Colby College.

On the day the Maine Principals Association voted on the proposal, Lam skipped school so she could be there to hear the results. The meet was saved.

“In the end,” she said, “I think it was kind of hard for them to ignore our opinion.”

High School Programs Across Bay Area Reeling From Cuts

By Ben Enos

July 4, 2009 Bay Area News Group. As California's Legislature struggles to come to a consensus on how to fix the state's ailing economy, school districts throughout Alameda, Contra Costa, San Joaquin and San Mateo counties are preparing for the worst when it comes to funding extracurricular activities.

Sitting directly in the cross hairs are athletic programs. Most people can't imagine a high school without sports, which sometimes are taken for granted as an indispensable part of high school culture.

That perception is about to change.

To make ends meet, many districts have decided to slash their athletic budgets for the 2009-10 school year. Whether it comes in the form of eliminating coaching stipends or merely asking teams to carpool rather than rent a bus, the impact will be felt across the Bay Area.

Nowhere is the problem more evident than in the Mt. Diablo Unified School District, which covers Concord, Pleasant Hill, Clayton and part of Walnut Creek. On June 16, the district's board of trustees voted to slash its entire contribution to its six high school athletic programs for the 2009-10 school year, a cut of $721,400.

The move left high school sports essentially unfunded and forced the district to introduce a new program — one where athletes are asked to donate money to play — to fund its programs.

The plan relies heavily on parent/athlete contributions to fund individual programs. For instance, an individual football player will be asked to donate $300 to play. That's in addition to a one-time $100 district transportation fee that each athlete has to pay.

"To think people have to pay for it, in addition to everything else they have to pay for, shouldn't be acceptable in the United States," said state Sen. Mark DeSaulnier, who represents California's 7th district, where the MDUSD sits.

Athletes in smaller sports will pay less (sport donations range from $300 for football to $50 for club sports such as water polo and golf), but there is no discount for multisport athletes other than a $600 per family ceiling.

The "pay to play" scenario is something every district has tried to stay away from, but it has now become a reality that has left many parents and athletes wondering about the future.

"I think it's worth it (to pay) to play football and not have to move," said Concord High football player Ricky Lloyd. "If we didn't have sports, I think I'd have to move to another district to play. I don't really care about the money as long as I get to play."

The story is similar throughout the Bay Area. The San Mateo Union High School District is planning to cut $50,000 from its athletic budget for the upcoming year, leaving athletic directors hopeful that boosters and other donors will step up to fill in the gaps.

Aragon athletic director Steve Sell even told staff writer Glenn Reeves that any teams taking part in tournaments will have to go to parents and the booster club to pay for their expenses.

As tough as things are now, consider the history of the West Contra Costa Unified School District for some perspective. Thanks to the passage of a $10 million parcel tax in 2008, the district will keep its sports fully funded this season.

That wasn't always the case. In 2004, the WCCUSD found itself in the same place many districts do now. Facing unprecedented budget cuts, the district elected to cut sports, music programs and library services.

"It was kind of trying because schools were going to give up sports," El Cerrito athletic director George Austin said. "It looked pretty bleak prior to getting the taxpayers to vote for a levy to save us."

Faced with the loss of all athletic programs, voters passed an $8 million parcel tax that restored funding to the affected programs. Since then, the WCCUSD has sought taxpayer help twice more, both times with positive results.

That money could run out after the 2009-10 season though, which means the district could find itself in the same dire straits as 2004. Rumors of another parcel tax on the ballot for the 2010 election are already swirling.

"Every time you go back to the well, it becomes a harder and harder thing to get done," Austin said. "We are lucky this year, but this will be the last year that we're living on borrowed time."

One district that may provide the exception to the trend is Oakland Unified. Thanks to an already-frugal approach, sport-specific fundraising and help from both the A's and Raiders, Oakland Athletic League commissioner Michael Moore said he does not expect any cuts to athletic programs. Athletes have not had to pay participation fees, and Moore said he does not expect that to change.

When it comes to high school athletics, the budget crunch isn't necessarily just an urban problem.

The Pleasanton Unified School District voted recently to eliminate $289,000 allocated for coaching stipends next season, instead asking boosters and parents to make up the difference. Livermore Unified is cutting its total athletic budget from $100,000 for two schools to just $50,000. Castro Valley Unified is implementing a donation system of its own, asking for athletes to pay $150 for a single sport, $100 for a second sport, and $50 per additional sport.

In almost every district, costs are being passed to the parents. "I think it would be great if the state and the districts had the money to fund these programs, but I think if the only way to have these programs is to charge these participants, we have to do that," said Granada athletic director Clark Conover. "I just can't imagine a high school without sports."

In Cutting Sports Funding, Everyone Loses

By Jay Mathews,

February 02, 2009 - Washington Post. Times are tough, particularly in our schools. We don't have the money, beleaguered education officials say, for every student who wants to play games after class. Some school sports have to go. Loudoun County is talking about cutting junior varsity lacrosse and all freshman sports. Fairfax County's proposed budget would end girls' gymnastics. Other teams are in jeopardy. The public high schools can't afford them anymore.

And yet many people who reflect for a moment will remember their own school days and see this kind of financial austerity as shortsighted, like cutting back on English classes because most kids already speak that language. Many of us remember some competitive activity, usually in high school, that became a vital force in our adolescence. It gave us a self-awareness and self-confidence that changed us forever.

None of us read all of the 481,563 articles published last year on the early life and struggles of the soon-to-be president of the United States, but most of us know that if Barack Obama had not discovered basketball he would not have become the leader he is today. On the opposite end of that scale of significance, I compiled the worst record ever at my high school, 0-14, in league play as the tennis team's No. 1 singles player. I didn't care much about winning. I got some exercise, and something even better. I was a total nerd, but I could strut around with my very own varsity letter, just like the football players. I still carry that morale boost.

At this point, professional researchers are grumbling. I am offering mere anecdotal evidence. In an era of economic uncertainty, we need solid data, and for once I have it. Education policy analyst Craig Jerald is about to publish a paper on the 21st-century skills movement that cites much recent research on the importance of after-school activities, particularly sports, in young people's future lives.

Jerald accumulated this data for the Center for Public Education at the National School Boards Association in Alexandria. In previous columns, I dismissed 21st-century skills as a fancy new label for good academic traits and discipline, but it might be more than that. Near the end of Jerald's report, he moves from the math and literacy skills that everyone talks about to something called "interpersonal competencies," more commonly known as life and career skills. The Partnership for 21st Century Skills says these include flexibility and adaptability, initiative and self-direction, social and cross-cultural skills, productivity and accountability, and leadership and responsibility.

In that last category, Jerald scores big for young athletes who are looking for a way to stop the bean counters from canceling the best part of their school day. He quotes a 2005 paper by economists Peter Kuhn and Catherine Weinberger for the Journal of Labor Economics: "Controlling for cognitive skills," they said, "men who occupied leadership positions in high school earn more as adults. The pure leadership-wage effect varies, depending on definitions and time period, from 4 percent to 33 percent." A Mathematica Policy Research study also shows that although math had the biggest impact of any skill on later earnings, playing sports and having a leadership role in high school also were significant factors.

Maybe that has nothing to do with gutting it out on the last lap of the backstroke or launching off the pommel horse for good old Beltway High. Maybe athletic talent produces leadership skills even if you never go out for school sports. But research indicates otherwise. Kuhn and Weinberger found evidence, Jerald said, "that leadership is not just a natural talent, but one that can be developed by participation in extracurricular activities." Christy Lleras last year wrote in Social Science Research that students who participated in sports and other extracurricular activities in high school had higher earnings 10 years later, even when compared with those with similar test scores.

I am typing this the same day I watched two splendid young educators, working as instructional coaches, put the math and reading faculties of a previously troubled D.C. middle school through a series of skill-building exercises. The coaches' work seems to have helped test scores. I asked these leaders of teachers about their high school days. One was captain of his swimming team. The other was captain of her soccer team.

If cutting back on sports means we will have fewer people like that to help save our schools, isn't that a false economy? Helping teenagers discover that with grit and teamwork they can do something very well is not an aspect of schooling I want to sacrifice, even if it saves a few thousand dollars.