I’ll throw a post up for all the folks who are feverishly scrolling through proposed school budgets for the 2013-14 year. Make no mistake, hockey is in the cross hairs.
Please, take minute and post if your district is proposing cuts to ice hockey. Leave an update in the comments section. From the discussions I’ve had with various athletic directors, we’re going to see a number of freshman and modified programs disappear, too, in all sports. The schools are going to blame the 2-percent cap.
There is a story here that goes way beyond hockey, and it will get done eventually, In the mean time, consider this … if you want your kid to play sports and be ready for a junior varsity or varsity team in the future, you’re probably going to have to open up the wallet and pay to play outside the school program. In other words, this is going to feed a setup that eliminates a number of participants based on a financial wherewithal.
Share your thoughts, how much importance do you place on a strong athletic program within the schools?
19 Comments
MAMARONECK NO WE ARE GOOD!!
Mike, it’s already happening at Byram Hills where a good chunk of the hockey team’s funding comes from team members families, which i think has been happening for the 3-4 years at least. But I do think it will spread to other sports as well which is a shame.
Most teams require the families to chip in to help offset what the school has to pay for the program. Depending on the district it could be a few hundred per player or a thousand bucks per player (or anywhere in between). 5 Hole probably has some insight into this (if he’s still reading at this time of year), but I believe in Lakeland, the school pays next to nothing and the families pay the bulk of the costs.
Some schools (like Suffern) do a ton of fundraising to help pay for the team between the raffles, merchandising, ads in the yearbook, golf outing, etc.
In Yorktown families paid 1100 last year. The team gets one ice slot per week. There is no modified program. I think the school contributes the coaches salary and that is all.
Mike, thanks for setting the stage for this discussion. I would love to hear how anyone reading this blog has defended their program from budget cuts. Most schools will adopt a budget within a few weeks and people should be looking now to see exactly what is going to happen to their team.
Usually the schools pay the coaches salaries, busing, and league fees. Then teams raise money for the ice slots for practices and games.
Another interesting question is this. Which schools are still fully funded?
what???I planned on starting an all black ice hockey team at mv or peekskill hahahah
What?? Try starting another kind of team with just yourself. You’ll need to be flexible.
Mamaronexk is fully funded with 25 kids on 3 different teams and still can’t win a section title. Gee. I wonder why.
Does anyone have stats on how the game of hockey is growing in our area?
The teams that play out of Palisades Mall are school funded for ice time, coaches salaries, ref fees, et al.
On ice practices are 3 to 4 times weekly with usually very good time slots right after the school day ends.
Both combined teams ( the Clarkstowns and Nyack/Tappan Zee) raise money through booster clubs to pay for additional season long expenses. I’m not sure if mandatory player fees need to be paid to the booster club, but I’m sure they are not being paid to the schools.
The modified teams are also school funded.
All said, this is a pretty good deal for hockey players, relatively low cost hockey and convenient and quality ice slots.
I’m not a fan of high school sports mergers unless absolutely necessary due to player availability needs, but there is no arguing that mergers help maintain the expensive sport of hockey in the schools.
Mamaroneck is fully funded, but have awful ice times. JV and Modified often have practice at 5 a.m. on school days. But they are so used to it, it does not phase them.
Suffern does have funding through the school district but parents also pay almost a thousand bucks per player. Suffern practices every day so my guess is parents will have to pay more in the future if the budget hits hockey.
I have heard of $1000 per player in the past and sometimes a little less. But it looks like it will soon be much more for some schools. Many parents spend plenty more for travel hockey and the cost of varsity or modified hockey is small in comparison to most travel programs. But on principle, it does not see fair to cut more funding out of hockey budgets until other sports have had their taste of “pay for play” to some degree. Maybe then we will get some more resistance to school budgets from a broader base of parents. And when those parents attack the hockey budget, the hockey parents can stand firmly with the fact they are already paying a good size chunk. It is my opinion most parents are unaware an “expensive” sport like hockey is already heavily funded directly by players’ parents.
Cost per player…. Hockey is far and away the most expensive sport in High School. Why do you think Long Island does not have high school hockey teams? And Long Island taxes are worse than westchester. Yet they don’t have a real league.
Now that Kennedy has joined the CHSAA is there any insight on what happens to the K/PV merger?
I’m sure it’s defunct, but will PV join up with any other school?
Will Kennedy kids play in the High School Club league out of Orange County?
Or how about a Kennedy/Stepinac merger for the CHSHL?
Al
Kennedy could play as an independent in Section 1, but would not be allowed to play in the postseason tournament.
http://m.wellsvilledaily.com/svc/wlws.svc/getHtml%23article/?articleId=x1551267003&isUniqueArticleId=true#article/?sectionId=1262&feedId=1698&articleId=8167217