(Boone) The Iowa High School Athletic Association’s classification system has come under fire in recent years.
Among the complaints about the current setup are a lack of differentiating private and public schools and a growing disparity between the haves and the have nots in larger cities. We’ll dive into these over the next week. Tom Keating, Executive Director with the Iowa High School Athletic Association, explains the current system that is in place and why. “The history if you go back to the beginning when there was one class I think there was a feeling that schools that had more students had an advantage over those that had fewer students just as a pool of possible athletes.”
Different classes have been utilized as early as the 1950’s in some sports. When schools first became split up between classes, school size was the simplest and most common method. “Most states that went that way used enrollment. That was the number they had that was the easiest way to go. Since the concern was more students equaled a better pool we decided to use enrollment and we have done that ever since.”
In basketball, for example, a two Class system became the norm in 1967 with a third class added in 1975. The current setup of four classes began in 1993. The association is evaluating the current model. “As with anything, people have ideas about how we could look at classification differently than we do by using just enrollment. We have assembled a classification committee that met two times prior to COVID hitting. We were scheduled to meet a few other times to talk through what the options might be. We’ve looked at other states to see what they’ve done. We’ve engaged our AD’s and certainly coaches have reached out to us with their ideas as well.”
Coming up tomorrow we’ll hear from one of those coaches, Glidden-Ralston’s Cole Corson, who has put together a detailed plan of his own for a new model. Specifically, Corson will give his thoughts in regards to the outdated nature of a strictly enrollment based classification system.
