Key to private school debate is informing

Denise McArthur
May 13, 2010
Filed under Opinion

Even though the OSSAA board and committee have been having huge discussions over the public vs. non-public issue, Kelley will not be drastically affected by any of the decisions made. One of the smaller things that was decided in the OSSAA meetings was that every school must have their average daily membership confirmed by an accrediting agency. This is nothing really new to Bishop Kelley, in fact, it adds validity to the argument that “ADM’s” are not altered for placement purposes as has been suggested by many public schools regarding private schools enrollment numbers. This is a rule that has been around but needed to be brought up and reinforced. Kelley has always and will always continue to follow this rule.

An additional rule that will come from the public vs. non-public committee’s proposals is that all non-public or private school’s boundaries will be able to be found on the OSSAA website for viewing.

But, the big argument at the OSSAA meeting was about whether private schools recruit. Kelley’s athletic department does not receive any money directly from the school. The funds for our athletic department come from gates from home games, booster club membership and sponsorships, and finally all concession, and spirit store clothing sales. Occasionally, there will be a donation or two, but the most valuable point is that Bishop Kelley does not give athletic scholarships to any students. Besides being completely illegal, this would be financial suicide. The school depends on tuition to maintain its daily operations. One of the proposals that came from the public vs. non-public committee was to add a multiplier to private school’s daily attendance. If this were to pass, each private school student would count as 1.3. This would mean Kelley’s enrollment would be counted as 1,092 even though we only have 840 students in attendance. This would make us one the of largest schools in 5A.

This basically insinuates that a private school student is 1.3 percent better than a public school student. How can the OSSAA decide that one Kelley student is better and counts as more than one Memorial or Edison student? If the board and committee decide that this is fair, then I guess I will accept the compliment.

As Catholic school students, we need to be educated on this topic and be able to defend our school. We should help others understand what Bishop Kelley is about and start breaking the stereotype that all private schools recruit.