There's a new player on the national sports-media scene, and its goal is to cover every high school athletic program in the country. Thanks in part to $7 million of venture capital, MaxPreps is expanding from a regional high school sports site to a national one.
The Michigan-based advocacy group Communities For Equity (CFE) is best known for suing the Michigan High School Athletic Association over its nontraditional girls' sports seasons. But CFE would prefer that Title IX issues be addressed proactively by administrators at individual schools—not through court battles. To that end, the group has partnered with the Kent (Mich.) Intermediate School District, which includes 20 local districts, to construct a Title IX audit schools can use to track their compliance with the law.
From Camp Randall Stadium at Wisconsin to "The Big House" at Michigan, many football fans in the Big Ten consider their home venues to be sacred ground. So it's little surprise that when the University of Minnesota announced its new football facility would be called TCF Bank Stadium, it raised a few eyebrows. As the first football stadium in the conference with a corporate naming-rights deal, a building that doesn't yet exist has already drawn a lot of attention.
It's easy for administrators to feel caught between the need to have lush, green fields for athletes to play on and concerns about pesticide use. More and more states are adopting laws that require notification before pesticides can be applied, and complaints about pesticide use from neighbors and parents are increasing. Yet athletes still need safe playing surfaces, and no one wants to look at weed-ridden or patchy fields.
For football coaches at the University of Colorado, taking time out isn't just something to think about during late-game drives. Under the leadership of Head Football Coach Dan Hawkins, the entire staff is participating in a Coaches' Wellness Challenge this fall, aimed at reminding everyone that taking a break from work can be a good thing.
Come December 2009, more than one football team could be hoisting an NCAA Division II national championship trophy. A proposal to create two championships in the division has been introduced by a special Football Task Force and will be voted on at the 2007 NCAA Convention in January.
This summer, administrators at California (Mo.) High School instituted a new requirement in their athletic department: All head coaches must be full-time faculty members. The intent of the move is to increase communication between coaches and players, their parents, and other teachers.
In the last 15 years, the state of Oregon has experienced a 400-percent increase in its Hispanic population. Oregon's Hispanic Chamber of Commerce lists Hispanics as the largest ethnic group in the state, representing over 11 percent of the population and $5 billion worth of buying power.
They say everything is bigger in Texas, but the state's count of female athletic administrators is still quite small. As the Mansfield (Texas) Independent School District Director of Athletics, Debbie Weems is one of just five women in the job among the over 100 high schools in the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex.
Even the most up-to-date athletic complex with the best equipment can have underlying safety concerns. Our expert outlines how to spot and fix the hazards before any injuries occur.
How do you shape what is being discussed about your athletic department on social networking Web sites? By joining in.
By Joe Dysart
Joe Dysart is a consultant and speaker on Internet issues. He is based in Thousand Oaks, Calif., and can be contacted via his Web site: www.joedysart.com.
Imagine this scenario: You work in one of the largest school districts in the country, where all 16 high schools are within five miles of a beach. All the high school students are dismissed at 1:35 p.m., prime time to enjoy the beautiful surroundings. Oh, and did I mention that two of the top-10 beaches in the country are located in your district, one in your high school's backyard?
This is the dilemma we face at Pinellas County (Fla.) Schools, and more specifically at Dunedin High School, located on a peninsula just west of Tampa Bay. Competing with the lure of sand and sun, we often struggle to get students to come out for our athletic teams.
Constructing an athletic facility in today's world means pleasing many different constituencies. Yet it must all still come together like pieces in a puzzle.
By Abigail Funk
Abigail Funk is an Assistant Editor at Athletic Management magazine. She can be reached at: afunk@MomentumMedia.com.
Everyone wants athletes to respect their opponents, officials, and the game itself. Making that happen means training your coaches on how to model and teach behavior.
David Hoch, EdD, is the Athletic Director at Loch Raven High School in Baltimore County, Md. He is the past President of the Maryland State Athletic Directors' Association and a frequent contributor to Athletic Management. He can be reached at: dhoch@bcps.org.
As the number of international collegiate athletes continues to grow, new programs are being implemented to help them transition and find success.
By Kenny Berkowitz
Kenny Berkowitz is an Assistant Editor at Athletic Management. He can be reached at: kb@MomentumMedia.com.
Is it okay if a school's varsity teams regularly get trounced game after game? What if the problem stems from socioeconomic factors? And are there any solutions? Those are the questions many athletic administrators are starting to delve into as they examine competitive equity in high school athletics.
By Laura Smith
Laura Smith is an Assistant Editor at Athletic Management. She can be reached at: ls@MomentumMedia.com.