Communications - It’s Important To Your Conference

"Set the example, Don't be the example"

Over the past several months I have noticed that both college and high school athletic conferences lack of communications have hurt their individual athletic program and there conference. Airing your “dirty laundry” in the media can be harmful to goals you are trying to achieve. Most times it draws more attention to the issue.

All of the examples below are from actual newspaper accounts of the events. These examples show the need for you as a school to have a line of command in issues that pertain to your conference. Below you will see how everyone involved is embarrassed by the actions that were done and reported in the media. Both of the below examples could have been avoided by a simple in-house meeting before attending a conference meeting and getting proper direction on any issue.

College -
Presidents of the XXXX Athletic Conference have decided XXX University can compete for postseason tournaments and awards while it’s exploring a jump from the NAIA to NCAA Division II.

Athletic directors had recommended that any school being considered for membership in another league outside the NAIA be required to forfeit its eligibility for titles and awards.
High School -
XXXX superintendents might be a little upset with their principals. School boards are supposed to make the major decisions for their school districts, and conference membership fits that framework. I’m hearing that XXXX superintendents are reminding their principals — who sit on the XXXX executive committee and attended yesterday’s meeting — that the principals don’t have the authority to do what they did; i.e., threaten the XXXXX with massive conference realignment.
Fighting online -

Below are two statements of School Superintendents on opposite sides of a "messy" HS conference change in members. We highly recommend that you never put your "dirty laundry" in the media. One of the messages was posted on the school's web site, the other was sent as a letter to the editor of a local newspaper. They both showed up on a highly viewed sports forum and discussed by many people on both sides of the issue and some of the "bad sides of human nature" were passed on by the forum writers. The internet makes this information available to a large audience, no matter where it is posted. Nothing good comes from either of these statements, they are very harmful to what high school athletics should be about, they both miss the mark. These two articles do not show student-athletes that there is more to athletics then winning at all cost. There were many different ways all of this could be handled and with out all of the "clutter" we see in these statements. It is our hopes that this information might help you avoid what has happened to these schools and conferences.

1^st Superintendent’s Letter to the editor:
That is why it is terribly disconcerting to have received news that today five schools (not including ourselves and XXXX) intend to sign a letter expressing their intent to withdraw from the league and form a new league. While this may have been an eventual outcome, what is so disturbing is that this was all done in secret without the remaining schools’ knowledge, and then blindsiding us with the information. This is a clear attempt to circumvent the league constitution, utilize strong-arm tactics to maneuver discussions to one side, and end any productive talks.

2^nd Superintendent’s reply -
How did it get to this? I will spare you all of the details, but some explanation is required. When XXXX decided to leave our league there seemed to be some consensus that XXXX filled the bill perfectly in size and geographical location. Over the course of the last year this league has struggled to find a team that could garner 6 out of 7 need votes for admitting a team in the league. There have been NUMEROUS formal and informal discussions surrounding the league.

If your league ever goes through a change of membership there are proper ways of handling the PR and media relations.

*-Appoint 1 person to be the spokesman for the conference or your school, this person needs to be the main source of information and details for the conference. When questions concerning the conference come from media, immediately they should be forwarded to the spokesperson. The spokesman needs to answer them in a positive way, if he doesn't have the answer...tell the media person you will find it out for him. Member schools should not be answering in-depth questions about the conference, that should be the job of the conference spokesperson.

*-Media contact list - put together a list of contact information, email addresses work well, and send out releases after any event takes place. Give the basic information, to much information can be bad for the issues you are looking at to solve.

*-Never give more information out then is needed, if you are looking to expand don't tell who you are looking at for membership. This protects schools who are not accepted, if they are not admitted to your conference, let them decide if they want to release that information.

College and HS administrators need to see the importance of how there actions effect student-athletes. That is why we think it is important to "Set the example, Don't be the example".

The Ohio High School Athletic Association has a program called, http://www.ohsaa.org/RTG/default.htm

RESPECT THE GAME in which two of the paragraphs say..."Respect the Game": is just a reminder of what you already know: high school athletics is important and valuable.

As such, it's worthy of respect. And when people involved in high school sports treat each other badly, disrupt games, or generally behave in a manner unworthy of the game itself, they are devaluing what you, and all of us, care so much about.

Good advice for us all.