The WIAA’s proposed Competitive Balance Plan would be bad for the Prescott School District.
If the plan passes a vote by the more than 500 WIAA member schools this month, the Prescott girls …
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The WIAA’s proposed Competitive Balance Plan would be bad for the Prescott School District.
If the plan passes a vote by the more than 500 WIAA member schools this month, the Prescott girls golf team would have to compete against Division 1 schools effective the 2024-25 school year.
Athletics and Activities Director Andrew Caudill told the Prescott School Board at its meeting Wednesday, March 29 he intends to cast Prescott’s vote against the proposal.
The Competitive Balance Plan was intended to make sports more equitable for smaller school districts which have to play against private schools from large communities in WIAA tournament play.
The WIAA Board of Control endorsed the committee proposal March 7. The vote from WIAA member schools is scheduled for April 26.
“This will be the most significant change to how high school sports have been governed since 2000 when private schools came under the WIAA umbrella,” Caudill said.
He said the plan is the WIAA’s way of addressing the “public vs. private school debate.”
“Prescott will be opposing this proposal,” he said. “The majority wins. If it passes, it will go into place August of 2024.”
Under the plan, schools that win a state championship are assessed four points. Schools that qualify for a state quarterfinal get one point. Wins after that equal more points. Schools with more than six points over three years are moved up a division for state competition.
The Prescott golf team would be moved up to Division 1 for golf, as it has won three consecutive state titles, giving it at least eight points already, not counting what would happen this coming year.
Schools can appeal their placement to a committee, but Caudill cautioned that committee work isn’t transparent enough, and its decisions are final.
Another interesting aspect is that if a school is bumped up a division, it also causes a school already in that division to be moved down a division for state competition.
WIAA divisions for each sport are based on third Friday September enrollment counts. The new plan would allow schools to appeal their placement, regardless of the point system.
“That’s going to cause some challenges,” Caudill said. “If a school is moved up a division, someone is going to have to move down to replace them. The process is not transparent. You will not know if you will be moving up. You will find out some day that you are the school moving up. That can’t be appealed. You can’t appeal it. The appeals process doesn’t cover that. That’s a headscratcher.
“This impacts public schools just like it impacts private schools. There are a lot of individuals that wanted the private schools tackled. The procedure is going to treat them all the same. It’s not equal.”
He said private schools control their enrollment and don’t have to take all students, like public schools do.
Caudill is expecting the measure to pass.
“They’re very confident because at no point in time have they adjusted it. It just keeps going down the tracks like nobody’s stopping it,” he said. “It’s truly down to the membership now. My vote will be no. Being one of 500, we’re preparing for it to pass.”
In the golf scenario, Caudill said Prescott, with enrollment of 457 students this year would play in Division 1 against schools with thousands of students. The biggest Division 1 school this year is Middleton, which has 2,378 students. On top of that, many school districts in golf join together for cooperative teams.
“We could playing against teams with more than 5,000 students,” Caudill said.
Prescott could appeal being moved up by the plan to a 15-member panel made up largely of athletic directors and superintendents.
“There’s no rubric. If they say no it’s no. It’s hard to know what they’ll do. You’ll hope your argument wins the day,” he said. “In my professional experience, putting your fate in the hands of an appeals committee, appeals don’t get approved that often.”
He predicted in some sports, the teams that have been strong in Division 2 will all get moved to Division 1.
“All the good schools will be in D1. All the others will be in D2. It’s a slap to programs that have built their way up. It’s a hard sport to build in a public-school setting,” Caudill said. “We’ll have to appeal. We already have the points in the current system. I think it will pass. There are too many schools happy that it’s something rather than nothing. We’ll have to adjust to see where it goes. It will have a huge impact on us.”
Board member Steve Sizemore asked, “Who thinks this is a good idea?”
In a sport like basketball, many of the most successful teams are private schools that compete in Division 2.
“The city schools are struggling to compete now. Milwaukee, Racine, Kenosha, Madison, they’ll want to go down. The suburban schools in those areas are nervous. They’re going to have to go up,” said Caudill.
The appeals committee process takes 15 days. However, in football, not all teams qualify for playoffs. The brackets are set following the last Friday night game and released Saturday morning.
Somehow, appeals for teams to move up or down have to be heard in that time frame as well.
“We’re not really sure how they’re going to do that. It’s the same process. Instead of two weeks, it’ll be eight hours,” Caudill said.
He said if it passes, he’s going to work out scenarios with coaches this summer to be prepared in sports where Prescott could move.
“It’s going to be an impact for sure. It will take a couple years to adjust,” he said. “This is probably coming.”
The Competitive Balance Plan
From the WIAA Website
Based on the work done by the committee and a review of many plans submitted by WIAA members and those being utilized in other state associations, including consultation with those leaders, the committee developed a Competitive Balance Plan.
As proposed, beginning with the 2024-25 school year, after using school enrollment to make the initial determination, as has been the case for decades, a tournament performance factor will be used to determine divisional tournament placement for all WIAA sports.
The tournament performance factor will be based on the following. Points will be awarded based on the team's finish in the tournament series over three years. Teams will receive 4 points for winning a state title and 1 point for advancing to the state quarterfinal, for example.
Each WIAA school may submit a request form to the WIAA indicating the classification in which the school wishes to compete. Based on enrollment, requests for reclassification and the tournament performance factor, the WIAA will then determine in which classification-level a school should compete. A school will be promoted to a higher level when a team has achieved six or more points over a three-year period. A school failing to meet the designated deadline will not be permitted to request a classification other than the one assigned by the WIAA.
Schools will be evaluated by the tournament performance factor after each season, and it will be calculated and applied on a sport-by-sport basis. Teams promoted using the tournament performance factor will be promoted to the next higher division for the next year. No team will be moved to more than one division per year.
A classification committee, comprised of members serving three-year terms, will hear appeals made by schools and will consider the following factors when placing programs in a higher or lower division upon a school's appeal:
All schools will be allowed to appeal their placement to the classification committee using the aforementioned factors as the rationale. A successful appeal requires a favorable vote of a simple majority of those classification committee members voting. All decisions of the classification committee will be final.
