Football and cheerleading are big question marks and other fall sports’ season kick-offs are being delayed until at least Sept. 23, Oregon Schools Activities Association Executive Board decided last week.
All fall sports, including football, are being allowed to start practice Aug. 17, to give schools time to acclimate to changes they’ll need to make in reopening this fall, the OSAA said.
Daily doubles will not be allowed in any sport, said Sweet Home High School Athletic Director Nate Tyler, though any summer workouts currently underway are allowed to proceed as they have been.
But since football, cheerleading and dance/drill are considered full-contact activities per the governor’s and Oregon Health Agency guidelines, they are currently prohibited.
Meanwhile, Washington has opted to move high school football to the spring and has produced a four-season schedule that extends the sports year through the end of June.
California will not have any high school sports until December, it announced July 20.
With the uncertainty of school reopening plans in many parts of the state and the time frame related to those decisions, the OSAA Executive Board decided to delay the first contest date for cross country, volleyball and soccer until Sept. 23, the organization announced last week in a statement.
Tyler said local athletic directors believe there will be a fall season “of some kind.”
“I don’t know if football wil be included in that,” he added. “We don’t know if it will be OSAA-sanctioned or not, but I do believe there will be competition, particularly in the other sports.
He said the Aug. 17 date was the first the OSAA has given the sporting community, “any time line.”
OSAA may wait till as late as Sept. 28 to decide what to do about football, he said.
“It will something like four or five games, with an abbreviated postseason,” he said.
“We don’t know. That’s the frustrating part.”
The decision to ban daily doubles came from the OSAA Executive Board, which adopted two recommendations last week from its Sports Medicine Advisory Committee.
The first change prohibits multiple practice sessions on the same day for the 2020-21 school year.
The second mandates a minimum of nine practice days for any student participating in a fall sport or activity, which unifies fall sports and activities and provides students time to acclimatize before participation versus another school. As winter and spring seasons approach, the board will consult with the SMAC to determine if this same mandate is necessary, the OSAA said.
“During the past few weeks and months we’ve received countless emails advocating for the safe return of school sports and activities,” OSAA Executive Director Peter Weber said. “The OSAA Executive Board and staff share the passion and desire expressed by this communication and have been advocating with the Governor’s Office accordingly.
“Just as schools will not look the same in the Fall of 2020, it’s clear that school sports and activities will not either. It’s important to remember that any participation that can be done safely is a positive step forward for the physical health and mental well‐being of students and their communities.”
The OSAA Executive Board will meet again the week of Aug. 3 as they and the staff anticipate additional information regarding reopening plans by schools and further school sports and activity guidance from the state.
Weber said the new practice dates “allow for local school control regarding fall practice schedules, while enabling them to focus on their primary objective of reopening to students. Decisions schools are making regarding their instructional models – on‐site, hybrid or distance learning – are still being discussed locally.”
Sweet Home is committed to a hybrid model – a combination of in-class and online learning, using the Canvas online education system, and Lebanon is considering the same for its upper grades.
Weber said the plans for fall may be impacted by a variety of factors, including “any new health metrics set forth by the Governor’s Office and OHA.
Additional guidance for fall contest protocols, including multi‐team events, spectator policies, and regional scheduling considerations, will be forthcoming, he said.
“The OSAA Executive Board understands that if fall end dates are not extended then contest limitations, playoff structures, and championship events will need to be altered.”
Football
Weber said no definitive date has been established by the state for a review of the ban on football, but he said the OSAA has determined that it will be necessary to lift any restrictions on football by Sept. 28 “in order to have a modified regular season this fall that would include some type of restructured postseason.”
He said if football and other fall activities can’t be conducted in the fall, the OSAA Executive Board will work to “exhaust all options for these activities, including shifting, condensing, or stacking seasons, like our neighbors in Washington and California.”
He acknowledged that that course of action may “force schools into choosing which programs they will offer and students into choosing between activities, but the board believes that a potentially difficult choice is better than no choice.”
Tyler said concrete directives aren’t there, “even though we’ve been in this several months.”
“People want answers. You look around the country and there are plenty of states and plenty of areas where sports are going on. If they can figure it out, Oregon should too.
“If it was up to me, we’d already commit to playing. Our coaches all want to be playing. They love sports and they are competitive, but they also know how important it is for kids’ mental health and well-being. I’m glad that our coaches have that mentality.”
Cheerleading / Dance & Drill / Music / Speech & Debate
As with football, cheerleading and dance/drill are currently prohibited, with no definitive date established by the state for a review of that prohibition.
OSAA staff is seeking clarification from the state as to how possible modifications to these activities could allow them to take place, Weber said.
“The OSAA staff and activities contingency groups are also working to develop best practices for rehearsals and considerations for competitive seasons that would include modifications to choreography, stunting/lifting, etc.
Music and Speech and Debate Contingency Groups will begin meeting in late July/early August focusing on competition elements and considerations for the coming year.
Academic Eligibility
In alignment with ODE’s Safeguarding Student Opportunity Clause, the OSAA Executive Board is amending the academic waiver process for the 2020‐21 school year.
Schools will be able to use transcripted grades from the grading period prior to the COVID‐19 showdown to determine eligibility for students that are academically ineligible based on incompletes from the final grading period of 2019‐20.
Such students will not be denied access to school sports and activities, provided that the student was eligible entering the final grading period of 2019‐20, the school has a Credit‐Earning Assurance Plan in place for that student and the student maintains eligibility in the current grading period based on progress reports.
Given the variety of approaches schools are adopting in preparing for the new school year, the board has instructed OSAA staff “to be flexible in working with schools to determine full‐time enrollment for the purpose of participation in the 2020‐21 school year,” Weber said.
He said OSAA staff have received several inquiries about students wanting to take a year off school and then returning in the fall of 2021.
“The OSAA Executive Board continues to support current OSAA policy allowing students eight consecutive semesters to participate with no additional eligibility being granted,” Weber said.
For the latest OSAA information regarding the Coronavirus pandemic, visit http://www.osaa.org/coronavirus.