REGIONAL CAUCUS MEETING
SHERATON PARKWAY CONFERENCE CENTER
THURSDAY, April 14, 2016
9:00 – 10:30 am – Richmond Room (AB)
AGENDA / DISCUSSION TOPICS
Regions
NorthNWOSSAA, NEOAA, NOSSAWestWOSSAA, SWOSSAA, CWOSSA
Chair – Tim Lowe NOSSAChair – Michele Van Bargen WOSSAA
SouthSOSSA, GHAC, ROPSSAACentralGBSSA, LOSSA, YRAA
Chair – Rob Thompson ROPSSAAChair – Shawn Morris YRAA
EastEOSSAA, NCSSAA, COSSAMetroTDCAA, TDSSAA, CISAA
Chair – Linda de Jeu COSSAChair – Patty Johnson TDCAA
Each chair is asked to take notes so that he/she can report briefly to the Representatives’ Council.
The following topics are intended to gather feedback and information. Please be prepared to report back to the meeting on what was discussed in your region.
ADVOCACY
One of the 4 pillars of OFSAA’s strategic plan is Advocacy. The advocacy ad hoc committee has been working on preparing a plan for OFSAA and would like input to assist them in moving forward with this process.
Information in italics is taken from the 2014-2017 OFSAA strategic plan to provide you with a framework for the discussion questions which follow.
Goal
Increase awareness of the importance of school sport in the development of high school students.
Key Objectives and Strategies
1. Position OFSAA as the primary advocate of secondary school sport participation with key decision makers.
a) Provide leadership to stakeholders to advance quality and safety, and promote participation in school sport.
b) Provide resources which promote the benefits of school sport.
OFSAA’s resources and
2. Leverage OFSAA’s resources and expertise to generate ongoing support and commitment from stakeholders.
a) Work with Boards of Education, school administrators and Athletic Directors to emphasize the importance of supporting school sport delivery at all levels.
b) Strengthen working relationships with government which generate opportunities to collaborate on school sport development.
c) Form partnerships with business and government to leverage OFSAA financial resources and generate additional revenue to offset operational costs.
- What training/resources/workshops are presently being offered in your area to promote coach development? What things would you like to see OFSAA support/offer to assist local associations – boards of education with this process?
EAST
Many of the areas of the east are doing the CPR / First aid training for coaches and teachers. Safe tackle programs are being offered as well. Some boards are providing training on PA days for staff. Safe concussion summit in Niagara Falls – teachers attending. Many areas are doing “inventories” of what coaches need. EOSSAA has a central coach development fund which teachers can access for coaching support. Many of the problems are related to costs – who will pay for courses and the high cost of having teachers off school. Like the idea of having training for CIAAA. More advocacy is needed. “Ambassador program” – time to educate principals, superintendents, CODE on what we do for kids. We need to have more access to funds from boards of education. Need to have hard data to show what we do is of value!
SOUTH
Nothing is currently offered to promote or develop coaches in general in some of our associations but in some boards safe contact training was given to football coaches and upcoming development training in hockey which covers checking/contact. Concern over the implementation of the OPHEA Safety Guidelines; could OFSAA lobby CORE to use PD Days for training to meet the guidelines? Boards indicate they are ``looking after it`` but this seems to be taking a long time. Perhaps OFSAA could expedite this process with the Boards.
CENTRAL
It was very different from area to area. Hoping OFSAA could help bridge the gap and help offer courses through PSO’s in different regions of province. Requirement for safety for high risk sports. Some boards are more organized than other. LOSSA – providing training for coaches over the exam period in June. They are still working out how supervision will work. Other boards Still organising things, hoping to use PA days. Don’t want to tax coaches and have them use their own time to take first aid course. It would be nice to have our Union on board with supervisions.
NORTH
With new OPHEA guidelines- need a plan to train coaches -this is a priority. What is available now? NWOSSA, only access to courses in Thunder Bay, NCCP. Mostly hockey. Individuals need to seek them out. NEOAA- Has had OFSAA coaching course 5 yrs ago, but no NCCP in area. NOSSA- NCCP track & field in Sudbury, some NCCP, but not sure if it covers the high risk sport training. FIRST AID- individuals need to seek them out, not provided or supported right now by boards. Funding? What can OFSAA do? Work with board to possibly have them free up PD day for training. Develop & offer a basic course that focuses more on the 'safety guidelines' and not the coaching aspect. Then perhaps you can group sports together e.g. all track high risk event training. More of a one shot type training. In the north due to online training, similar to 'speak out' in Minor Hockey. Engage isolated schools, get info to rural small schools. Advocate for training in Faculty of Ed - so when new teachers come out they are ready to coach.
- What are some of the best practices in your area to raise funds for athletic programs – without putting it on the back of student athletes?
How best do you think school athletics should be funded?
How are schools/boards currently funding athletics? – I.e. school budget support, board special funds, student fees, fund raising, etc.
EAST
Some boards are splitting costs with schools for athletics. Many - the costs are on the backs of kids. All are underfunded. We have lost ability to fundraise – pop machines, bingos etc. Some schools run summer camps using high school athletes as counsellors to make money. Training of high school students as officials – running elementary tournaments and then officiating – money raised to extracurricular programs. Many it is a pay to play program. Is it time to bring corporate sponsorship to high school sport?
SOUTH
Schools try to find a balance between student user fees and the school paying. Coaches and ADs may need more information from Principals about how school budgets work; there may be money there that they don’t know about. Some differences amongst the group about how tournament absences are covered – supplies or on-calls. Some are using team fundraising where team gets to keep any money raised. Essentially it comes down to how supportive your Principal is concerning athletics; if they are supportive they will find the money.
CENTRAL
Found that fundraising in the different areas varied quite a bit from region to region based on demographics of the school area. Those who have lots of money in the area are able to – unfortunately those in lower demographics have a tougher time with it. We found that it was easier for schools “Who ran their own Food” made it quite a bit easier to fundraise money, compared to large corporations running the food services. Alumni at some schools have set up Booster programs to help fundraise – was outside of parent council and allowed them to do more, not as many restrictions.
NORTH
What is happening now? Tournaments, Special events- Bingo, dinners, auction, bottle drive, raffles. User fees-anywhere from-$25 to $700 depending on sport. Some are a general fundraising account for school and teams draw from this. Some teams have bigger costs because of travel and they fundraiser on their own VERY VARIED. The cost of sports is really on students/coaches back, through user fees or efforts in fundraising. What can OFSAA do? Advocate for consistency in cost for every student participating-not consistent through province. Advocate for covering officiating costs. Advocate for release time for safety or officiating training. Cover travel costs as now it is varied and maybe not as safe as it should be - kids getting there on their own. Advocate for transportation cost to OFSAA Championship to be covered. Advocate for more parental help in fundraising.
OFSAA TRANSFER POLICY
- What are the challenges in your local associations (if any) with the current policy when making student eligibility decisions?
EAST
Problem with current eligibility policy is there is no “common sense” section – we know it would be best for student to participate but there is no section that they are eligible under – not transferring for sport – but for their well being. There are many exceptional circumstances that we need to be able to allow kids to participate.
SOUTH
No real issues with the policy. Issue seems to be forms not being submitted correctly. Training sessions offered but are very poorly attended.
CENTRAL
All three associations were already pretty much in line with the policy so we haven’t found there to be too many issues. Found it nice that the team who competes throughout the year is now the same team that will be competing at OFSAA.
NORTH
Native students who move because their 'educational council' decides to change their school have no option to select on the transfer from. Their family have not moved. NWOSSA are making them eligible.
Problem, now is if your association is making people locally eligible, with new eligibility rules, they make their team ineligible for OFSAA. This is still an issue. Students leaving the community to play high level sports (outside of school), are currently not allowed to participate in a sport while away and then return to play in their homes school. Is this exclusionary?
2. The current section di) of the transfer policy states.
“The student has transferred prior to their grade 10 year for exceptional personal, social or academic reasons. The appeal must be accompanied by documentation from the sending school’s administration and/or independent sources to confirm the exceptional reasons.”
Please discuss any issues that local transfer committees may/are having with receiving documentation from the sending school’s administration.
EAST
Many administrators will support a students transfer but are hesitant to put it in writing.Confidentiality issues arise in some instances.Some boards in the East have good working relationships with admin and will not hesitate to write the letters.We would like to see a “section f” – wording from Di – but without the grade 10 stipulation.
SOUTH
Admin from sending schools seem reluctant to put issues or problems in writing. May be confidentiality issues. Is there an opportunity for previous school to indicate they aware the student has transferred but that they are supportive of the student participating at the new school? Can we get letters from other officials at the sending school other than Admin – ie guidance counsellors, CYWs?
CENTRAL
New rule having administrators send letter. We found it was really important (without breaking too much confidentiality rules) that they explain there were situations that arose at the school and that the individual moving schools was a good thing. If the administrator had just sent a letter to endorse the move, that was not enough for the transfer to go through. Felt that there should be an awareness piece with the administrators and guidance counsellors and that they might not be aware of how the transfer process works.
NORTH
Attended a school for two days was ineligible. Several are passed without question TRANSFER WORKSHOPS should be video conference to let more take part and aid understanding of rule interpretation.
3. The Council of Directors of Education have expressed concernthe OFSAA transfer policy is being used to prevent, rather than to enable transfers of student-athletes, many of whom should be allowed to play and are not elite athletes, specifically for transfers involving a Specialized High School Major’s program.
Their perception is that local association committees do not understand or empathize re. SHSM's, or legitimate programs that should be granted exceptional status.
How many associations have SHSM’s?
What effects are SHSM’s having with respect to transfers?
Has your transfer committees seen a significant increase of students transferring to SHSM’s?
EAST
All school boards have SHSM programs. Very few students are transferring for these programs. We would like some stats on transfers affecting eligibility because in the East there are no issues. When we had focus programs – section f in the old eligibility looked after this program change. Is it time to rule all students who move “eligible” and place the emphasis on schools to prove that students are “not” eligible??? Would this save time and energy???
SOUTH
None of the associations experienced any real effect of SHSMs on transfers ; there are applications wanting to use transferring for a SHSM as a reason for approval but that is not considered an exceptional reason and there has been no strong resistance to this position. It would not appear that there is a noticeable increase in transfers due to SHSMs as most schools offer one or more.
CENTRAL
Not an issue in any of the three areas when it came to SHSM. All three associations hardly saw any transfers based on this. More of an issue with OYAP (Youth Apprenticeship program). we felt it really depended on whether the OSR was moving from school to school.
NORTH
SHSM- has not been a big issue. A few students in some regions but they are not applying for transfer.
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