leatherneck

Take a good look at this thing, because it kinda gets loud!!!!!!

Boom, love the photo...but there should not be an S after the '. (Instead of HHS'S 12th man it should be HHS' 12th man). Who taught you english anyway? Henry must have been the substitute teacher for that lesson. Ask her about theorems. Brilliant.

Will get back to you.

s=deketr

No i dont think the work ethic is it at all. You cant tell me that the big 2 work any harder during the off season than any of the NKY 4A teams. These teams work very hard all year.

I have to agree to the folks from Lville. I do think that some programs work harder than others. And very few if any work any harder than X and T ,which in my mind is THE major reason for their success over the years.

Having said that, I do think the NKY AAAA schools are getting closer. But if they want to beat the T's and X's, it will take more committment and more work than they are currently doing in my opinion.

A couple of early morning thoughts.

Sandman, you may be right. I am sure that there may be some households that aren't happy. But I've yet to see a team (including Dixe, or maybe particularly Dixie this year) that everyone was happy with the amount of playing time. Nonetheless the purpose of my post was not to question their happiness quotient; rather it was to express my respect and gratitude for the upperclassmen that keep working their tails off, keep providing good examples and keep being leaders even though they don't get much playing time and aren't "happy". I don't understand people that try and turn something positive into some negative or controversial. I guess they feel somehow better about themselves.

As for respecting FC, I know the players and coaches do; a lot. And I think most of the fans do. A friend of mine happened to catch the last FC game. FC is fast and quick and matches up with our style of play very nicely. He thinks we can beat them, but we have to play very, very well. Likewise, FC needs to play well if it expects to beat us. If they come up here really tight, with the Birds mystique heavily placed on their backs, it just may affect them.

Its the way it should be. Two good teams playing each other. Both needing to play well in order to advance.

That is my point. The highlands faithful point to the tough out of district schedule as a positive in preparing for the playoffs. Meanwhile your playoff opponent may have prepared with a bunch of district cupcakes. Fewer district games is an andvantage. Being allowed to schedule more games of your choice is a plus.

I think this will be covered by Proposal 21, under which all teams in districts with less than 6 teams will play in a separate state championship tournament from those in districts with 6 or more! (insert smiley face here; I forgot how to do that. I'm kidding about Proposal 21 by the way).

I keep hearing about the youth of Highlands, I noticed they had 19 seniors on their roster? Do these kids not play?

Some start and some don't. Some get on the field a lot and some rarely get on the field.

However, those that don't play much at all are just as valuable and important to the team as those that do in my opinion. Maybe even more valuable.

You don't have to be a starter or even get on the field to be a leader of a team. Leaders in my opinion are the ones that set the example; that the others look to when times are tough; they are the ones that are the most respected by the coaches, fans and other players.

Its easy to play football at Highlands when you are the star athlete, when you start as an underclassman. But the real people that I respect a lot are the seniors that have busted their tails for 4 years but get little or no playing time; yet they hang in there. That's real leadership to me. Not the jumping up and down before the game; not the "cheerleading" after a big hit or big run. Its the sheer will and dedication that is needed to make it through long days of triple sessions; the sacrifices on Saturday mornings; the gassers and the lost job opportunities knowing along that you'll not probably see the field on Friday night. To me its these kids are the ones that show real leadership.

Sure they'd like to play more, their egos get bruised when some underclassman takes their spot. But rather than quit or cause problems, they suck it up and continue to come to practice and try to the best of their abilities. These are the kids that lead by example, that personify the "no I in team"; and that want desperately for the team to win state and if the coach thinks the chances of that happening are better with the underclassmen starting in front of them, they are able to put their disappointment aside to best support the team.

These are the kids that provide the leadership needed on a young team. When the underclassmen get tired, they need only look at that senior who's at practice busting his tail knowing that he'll be lucky to get into the game on Friday night to find their inspiration to run that last gasser, to look at the scouting report one more time before going to sleep.

We do have a fair number of seniors that unfortunately for them were not blessed with the athletic talent that the good Lord gave some of the underclassmen; but they were given the qualities of persistance, dedication, committment and loyalty to team that make them the best of leaders in my eyes and will make them leaders throughout their lives. And for that, I say thank you.

When McKee made that statement Wilson Sears immediately chimed in that every person in the United States was entitled to a free public education and if they tried to keep incoming freshman changing from private to public schools that it would not stand up to legal scrutiny because it would infringe on the right of a parent to participate in all aspects of a public education.

 

Maybe the lawyers that read this forum can help me out but since the KHSAA is a voluntary organization aren't they given a fairly wide latitude in what rules they can enact and enforce? Could the KHSAA say that a student moving from a public to private school or vice versa for high school would be ineligible for their freshman year, and if they did so would it stand up to legal scrutiny?

 

One of the big arguments that the supporters of Prop 20 have used is that full participation in high school sports is a privilege not a right. How can anyone who supports basically keeping a significant number of students from enjoying full participation in interscholastic athletics with a straight face question this based on the legality of keeping a small percentage of students from full participation?

As most of you know, I am an attorney and I thought the same thing as you did AT from the first moment I heard Sears say that several weeks ago. I have not done any specific research on the law, but the logic that allows the KHSAA to make a transfer ineligible when he transfers from a private high school to a public high school his senior year would seemingly hold true when a graduate from a private middle school enrolls in a public high school wouldn't it? I mean a rule is a rule isn't it, and if sports are a privilage and if the KHSAA is a voluntary organization that no high school public or private is forced to join, why wouldn't such a rule be enforceable?

I think that HHS will expose the QB as not a true DIV. 1 Player. I have seen him play a handful of times and IMO he is not a Div. 1 Player?????

 

HHS - 28

lc - 14

Please keep in mind this is not coming from a Highlands fan. From everything I've been told about Burke, he's the real deal and that's coming from some folks who know a lot about talent including the Ru himself!!!

Actually JCPS schools do have a shadowing program......we have open enrollment so its one way a student get to look at a schools prograqms

Great. Does every public school aggressively use the shadowing plan? Sounds like the public schools are recruiting for students just like the private schools do in J County. And I have no problem with that. Its the way it should be.

He says things or obvious to him? Well, a lot of times that is not really the case, and people take liberties and see what they want to see and hear what they want to hear. Did the player, parent or relative talk to someone from these schools then get ask for a card or number? I am guessing there private school kids from Indiana had someone looking over their head being forced to email or call the KY schools? Maybe the school wasn't the one who made first contact, did he ever think of that? Also EVERY email has a block system, if the emails are unwanted they simply could have blocked the sender. Nothing wrong with inviting kids to an open house, Shadowing is something ALL schools should do for prospective incoming students, hey ALL schools could do this too. Again no one is being forced to do go, as long as they don't guarantee playing time in sports it's legal under KHSAA rules. The last part where he talks about financial aid, maybe a parent or the player mentioned concerns over the cost of attending the school and it was simply brought up that they COULD receive help, as ALL of their students COULD.

Maybe just maybe the public high schools should be doing the same thing and getting the 8th grade public school kids to shadow. But they won't because of the mentality that the public schools own the public grade school graduates and are entitled to them. Baloney. You own no one. You are entitled to no one. Go convince the kids and their parents that your high school is the best one for them. And if you won't or you can't, don't complain when the kid goes somewhere else.

How do you even know it even happened? Just because someone in a memo wrote that it happened? That's proof to you?

If so, then perhaps you'll believe this since it also is in writing: You've won $1,000,000 but in order to receive it you need to send me $10,000 in small bills. $20s would be fine.

I'm not trying to be cute and I hope the KHSAA looks into it, but its not proof until it is verified. Then's its proof. Case in point is the LexCath investigation. There were so many unsubstantiable allegations made it was silly. Rumors of rumors of rumors. There's a good reason why hearsay is inadmissible (in most cases) in a court of law: it is extremely unreliable.

Sounds to me like the school that lost their students wasn't getting it done or else the students parents wouldn't have sent them to the neighboring school district. Don't pull down the strong to prop up the weak. If you don't want brain drain, you improve your situation so the brains don't want to leave. That's just as true in education as it is in business. Putting regulations in place to stop brain drain doesn't work.

Sounds to me the Super of the school losing students has some work to do; motivating the teachers, coaches and administrators to do a better job and to turn out a better product; and to meet regularly with the parents to show them how the school is improving and why they should keep their kids in the school district. How often do you think that happens in the districts losing students to the non public schools or neighboring public school districts?

Now that is the job to have! :lol:

If I could just figure out a way to get paid by both sides, it would be a really good job to have!!!!

To answer your two points, I have bolded them.

 

1)I believe that would be the school aligns more closely with the parent's personal religious beliefs. Of course, public schools are not allowed to address this in any way, shape or form. Even to the point, people want the pledge of allegiance removed from the school system. I applaud the private school parents for staying true to their faith.

 

2)I applaud the school board members in staying true to their mission of educating youth in their community and not opening up the doors to field stronger athletic teams. Public schools have a different focus than privates. Publics are designed to educate youth in a community. Privates are designed, in most cases, to educate youth whose parents have some interest in a specific faith.

ladiesbbc, I also respect your views and the manner in which you present them, but and its a big BUT, I cannot disagree with you more in re point 2. True to the mission of only allowing students from within the district? Sorry, but I've never heard or read that mission statement anywhere. That's a new one. Frankly, I'd be mad as a hornet if we had space in our public school classrooms and we turned down out of district students who would generate money for the school district. Furthermore, you know good and well that if Ft. Thomas turned down a student living in Newport, all hades would be raised about what snobs we are. Heck, I think we have a great academic system in Ft. Thomas. Provided we have room in the classes, I think we have a moral obligation to accept as many students from out of the district as possible. Furthermore, what you are now saying is that if a parent lives in a community that has a poor public school (by poor, I mean one that is not doing well academically), now not only cannot the kid not go to a private school and hope to compete in meaningful athletic state championship competition someday, the kid also cannot enroll at a neighboring public school district that has a strong academic record because you don't think the neighboring school district with the strong academic record should accept students not in the community. Well we've now put the kid in chains and shackeled him to the terrible public school of his home district, haven't we? That's really teaching the kids and the parents who want better for their kids a real lesson. And America is the land of opportunity?

I can understand a some of your points in support of Prop 20, but saying that the public schools have a mission to only educate kids within the district and should not accept out of district students is not understandable at all to me. And I get paid to try to understand both sides of issues.

The BOC vote does raise an interesting question. Some on there represent certain regions. Let's say a region voted 90% for the proposal; should the rep had voted the way his regions voted.

While most of the BOC members do represent a region (4 however are at large members appointed by the BOE), the KHSAA Constitution states that the BOC shall review all proposed changes to the Constitution (which Proposal 20 is) and further states that the BOC shall have the authority to reject any proposed change that it determines is not in the best interest of the KHSAA. The 9 people who voted to "not recommend" the proposal felt Proposal 20 was not in the best interest of the Association. The one abstaining member wanted to get more info in re the financial cost, affect on redistricting and any other consequences the staff can determine that Proposal 20 will have on the Association before he makes any recommendation to the BOE. The 7 members who voted against the "not recommended" motion either felt Proposal 20 was in the best interest of the Association or felt that they were morally obligated to support the delegates vote regardless of what the Constitution tells them they are supposed to do.

A couple of things worth noting: this thing has a long way to go before it actually comes final. Stay calm and rational. Over reacting can do more harm than good.

Unless the privates schools are going to travel and look hard and long to find opposition, it makes sense for them to stay in the KHSAA (most state athletic associations will not permit their teams to play teams that are not a member of their home state's athletic association). So if X wants to play Colerain, Elder etc, they'll need to stay in the KHSAA.

One of the main supporters speaking in favor of the proposal talked as if the private schools were going to overrun the state. He referenced the number of "our kids" that were going to private schools (around 98,000 I believe he stated). He talked about the need for this proposal in order to make sure that public schools "survived". A wee bit melodramatic for me, but he clearly felt that if this proposal did not pass, it was only a matter of time before the public school system totally crashed due to the proliferation of private schools. Rather interesting to put it mildly.

Finally the vote was done anonymously so there will be no way of finding out who voted for and against it unless the voter him/herself discloses it. Before every one against the proposal starts going haywire, the anonymous vote was actually an attempt to prevent the proposal from passing. The thinking was that if it was an anonymous vote, the principals and ads would vote against it (against the direction of their superindentents). In this case it did not work.

I'm sure this thing will boil down to who puts the most pressure on the legislators. I honestly think that in the meantime there will be efforts to come up with acceptable compromises on the issues.

Final advise: again stay calm. No reason to do anything yet.

I do know that the rep for Highlands voted against the proposal-at least he told me he did and I am certain he was telling the truth.

Ziggy, I am not a catholic school alumni but I agree with your opposition in this thread. There is zero statistical info to support your original attack that athletes attending the catholic/private schools get more financial aid than the non athletes attending. You then morph your attack into your experience that CovCath comes to Ludlow to only when there are some good athletes. Even if true, so what? If Ludlow had the graduation rate, the college acceptance percentage, the discipline, the curriculum, the athletic success, etc. that CovCath does, then perhaps the Ludlow kids wouldn't be enticed to CovCath. This whole tuition issue is either a huge red herring, or an acknowledgement that the private school education is significantly better than your public school.

Even if the private school gave 100% financial aid, it would then cost no more nor no less than what Ludlow charges an in district kid to attend Ludlow, which is $0.00. The fact that someone would pay even half of the normal tuition and choose a private school is an indicator that those parents believe that the private education is better than the public education in that district.

I actually cheer and root for teams like Ludlow, Dixie and Boone County to be more successful athletically and academically (and its not become I'm a great guy either). When those programs struggle, it is only reasonable for parents living in those districts to consider other options and for most of them the first option is CovCath. When the public schools do well academically and athletically it eliminates major reasons for parents to even look at a private school, particularly if they have to pay ANY tuition. I'd rather see the public programs quit talking about the private school advantages and create some advantage of their own (like making their own districts places no student would ever leave). As I've stated in the past, if we had a lot of kids leaving Highlands to go to CovCath, I'd be focusing on improving Highlands, not whether CovCath was doing something wrong.

I don't know and I don't care. If even one student is singled out and told that the educational programs available to other students are not available to that student, it is wrong. I don't care if the number is 20 miles or 200 miles. What is missing from all of these proposals is any attempt to treat public schools and private schools exactly the same. If someone has a proposal that will do THAT, then that should be considered as a compromise. Short of that, NO!

I won't say much about this subject other than if the private schools take this type of hard and fast position, then proposal 20 is a sure thing in my mind. Period. And while the private schools may like to think that they have enough legislative clout to prevent this proposal from becoming the law, I'd be real concerned about that. There are a large number of public schools in Lville supporting proposal 20 (particularly if there is no compromise) that could offset the pressure the T and X alumni put on the area legislators. There are a large number of western Ky. public schools supporting proposal 20 and we know where old Jody Richards hails from. The public schools in Lex are particularly lathered up. If it comes down to nothing but politics I think there are a whole lot more public schools superintendents wielding large amounts of influence and public school alumni voters out there. If the privates don't accept compromise like the ones suggested, I think they will be forcing the hand of some public school superintendents that don't necessarily want to support proposal 20 but will feel they have to because of the rigidity of the privates position. Now is not the time to fight them on the beaches and in the city. This is Cuba embargo/nuclear war time and both sides need to think compromise.

Now you can see how blasphemous your statements were - I couldn't even tell if the caller was a man or a woman.

You better go tell Brandon Brown on the CCH team that you can't tell on the phone if his Grandmother is a man or woman!!!!!!

Did you even read the 3rd paragraph or just get so perturbed that you stopped at the first 2???????

 

Remember I responded to the mindset that said public schools have a harder time competing because of the incompetence of coaches. While that may be true in some cases, there are other situations for RURAL counties that make it difficult to compete against public schools in large metro areas and private schools.

So perturbed at the fallacy of the 2nd para or wherever it was in your post that I didn't bother to read any further. No one will deny that some schools have advantages over the other. The difference is that a lot of folks think those advantages were earned not given. Do mention the large alumni groups of St X or T as an advantage. Many many schools have more graduates. Energize them. I know it won't be easy, but do it anyway. If you are committed to doing it, it will get done. If there are zero golf courses in your county, pick up your golfers one aweek during the off season and drive them to the closest golf course even if its in the next county.

It is simply not that simple. It might be for the 4A public city schools but it is not that simple for the rural county schools.

 

Good example is golf. $2500 to be a member of the country club in my county. Only 5 of my 14 golfers are members. Can't afford it. So they get to play 2 months out of the year. I feel safe in saying that Notre Dame, Bishop Brossart, Villa Madonna, Lex Catholic, etc. more than 40% of their golfers find themselves as members of a country club.

 

I am NOT saying separate the two, but saying the situation is unequal and there is a distinct advantage. So when you say simply hire better coaches, you got to remember that rural, public school coaches have to do MORE and a BETTER job than the private school coaches, because the private school coaches are usually starting with better polished athletes. Unless you feel that a golfer can be just as good playing 2 months out of the year vs. a golfer than can play from April through October everyday of the week.

Guess Highlands and Beechwood will be next since my guess is that most of their golfers families also belong to country clubs. And after you've eliminated that layer of competition, who will be next? What a nice slippery slope you have started down.

And aren't there any public courses in your county? What do you want to do mandate the number of rounds that a golfer can play per year to make sure none of your opponents gets better than your player. Sorry but this is getting beyond silly.

I generally do not post critical comments about people and can't get into the merits of this proposal, but I was absolutely sick to read Superintendent Sanders state that a reason for the proposal was to allow more kids to attain a state championship. GARBAGE AND WORSE. Heck why don't they just give every one in all classes at his schools A's so they can all attain honor roll too. What a boneheaded idea. Great message for our kids: gee we are going to water down the meaning of a state champion, but maybe you'll get to be one! Just what our future leaders need to be learning as they get ready to enter a more and more competitive society: we want to make things easier for you. Not! I hope GT and JD are just as sickened with the Super's comments as I am.

Also don't forget that the AAA semifinals will be played in N. Ky will it not? Having that game at home is a huge advantage. How many times in the last 20 years has an eastern Kentucky school come up here and beaten a northern Kentucky AAA school in the semis? Not very often that's for sure.

Our thoughts and prayers are also extended to these young men and their families and friends.

It may be too late for this young man who was driving, but all you other teenagers who are driving, the next time you are thinking of flooring it and driving really fast, please reconsider and slow down. Reading these types of posts is so sad. Please use caution and lets read your name on here because of your athletic accomplishments. The only good that can come out of this situation is if some other kids come to the realization that it only takes one dumb or foolish moment to end a life or lives.