Greenwood, Loyal schools consider full athletic co-op for 2024

As the Greenwood and Loyal school districts continue down the path of collaboration, they are considering a plan to fully merge athletic programs by the 2024-25 school year.

Greenwood School District Administrator Joe Green presented a potential timeline to his school board at its latest meeting.

“Both districts are feeling that it’s in both districts’ best interest to consider just jumping in and creating a timeline to co-op all athletics starting in ’24-25, giving us a year to do some planning for it,” he said.

Cross country, wrestling and softball are currently cooperative programs. Middle school football will be co-oped this fall. The boards of both schools already decided to co-op JV and varsity football starting in fall 2024. Middle school and junior varsity baseball were co-oped this past season. No co-op decisions have been made about volley-ball, boys and girls basketball, varsity baseball or track and field.

Green said the numbers were low for middle school volleyball and middle school boys and girls basketball, resulting in just one middle school team for each sport. By co-oping, the school districts could have separate seventh and eighth grade teams, allowing students to play more at their own level.

“We’re also hoping that we can continue the baseball co-op that we started this year. It was super successful because there were a whole bunch of kids who would not have otherwise played baseball. I think that was a huge advantage for both districts — that there were a dozen kids that got to play a bunch of games. And we’ll be in the same boat next year. So I’m hopeful that we can continue on that path as well,” said Green.

He said the concept of cooperating to provide better extracurricular opportunities for students went beyond sports.

“For example, it makes sense to have a joint pep band if you have joint athletics. A lot of times we march in the same parades; it makes sense to talk about those types of things,” he said. “We also see our numbers going down a little bit in the band and choir. We have a large group of seniors exiting and a much smaller number of eighthgraders coming up. It’s not only music but drama — oneact and three-act plays. I talked to Jo Elmer today and she had seven kids signed up for one-act play. Loyal’s in the same boat… I think it would be wonderful to put on plays for both districts.”

He said the districts had already collaborated some-

Please see Co-op, page 18 Co-op, from page 16

what, through joint staff trainings, a guest speaker who spoke to students from both districts, and the juniors completing ACT prep together, to name a few examples. But he said there was a lot more that could be done. For example, when FFA students go to leadership seminars or on trips, the schools could just take one bus instead of two buses with 10 kids each, especially since the districts share a bus company.

The Loyal School Board met that same night. At the meeting, Loyal School District Administrator Chris Lindner referenced some other possibilities for co-oping, including Forensics, jazz band, swing choir or other musical ensembles; as well as sharing teachers between districts or moving students between districts so they would have the chance to take classes not offered at their home school.

“I know in talking with Mr. Green, we’re looking at trying to do as much as we can together just because we want to offer as much as we can,” said Chris Lindner. “And I know we’ve talked to some coaches about this and right now the two districts are in a little different spot, when you’re talking athletics. There’s a need more for this by them, but I think this is something that we definitely need to take a look at it and make sure that we are looking at the very near future doing more things with them.”

The Loyal School Board at its April meeting briefly discussed track and baseball co-ops, but no action was taken. The board had less interest in co-oping track than baseball, as the Loyal School District currently has a fairly robust track program, with 38 students out for track this past season and six state qualifiers.

Neither board took any action on new co-ops, but both voted to renew the softball co-op for the 2023-24 and 2024-25 school years.

From Greenwood’s perspective, board members who spoke seemed to be interested in the idea of an overall co-op strategy.

“Instead of doing it piecemeal — sport by sport — I would rather do it together, rather than having the same conversation over and over about kids being able to play at appropriate levels. If you look at middle school basketball, we have kids in sixth grade that are getting pulled up and it’s not getting any better,” said board member Dean Lindner.

“Well, and if you look at our senior class, we have more kids in the senior class (36) than any other grade in the entire district right now… The first grade has 20 kids,” said board member Eliza Ruzic.

Green said that Loyal’s class size numbers dropped off after eighth grade. As an example of the numbers issue, he said that for the fifth and sixth grade baseball co-op, Greenwood had eight kids, more than Loyal had.

“They would be doing the same thing — killing the program because eventually you will have ninth and 10th graders playing with 11th and 12th graders when they’re not ready to. If you double the numbers (through a co-op), now you’re talking about a program,” Green said.

Green said that co-oping would also expand the pool of coaches the schools had to draw from, especially helpful as both districts have at times struggled to find coaches for the lower levels.

“I think we have dynamic coaching staffs between the the two schools, so by putting our heads together it would be a huge advantage just in the knowledge base we gain,” Green said.

He acknowledged that although he could see many benefits to collaboration, there had been and would likely continue to be a few bumps in the road as they made the transition.

“We have some things to figure out. Oversight is a big one. So I’m OK with pumping the brakes a bit and making sure we’re doing it right. We’ve learned a lot with things we’ve already collaborated on,” said Green.

“We have to remember why we originally decided to formalize co-oping and sharing. Number one, it’s not consolidation. But secondly, it was an attempt to make sure our doors are open. So if there’s something Loyal needs that Greenwood has, or vice versa, it’s there for them. We have to stop picking and choosing. Both districts in the past have been guilty of saying, ‘Not right now. We’re not ready now. We will be in a couple years.’ But those never line up. So we have to stop handpicking some of those things and just be open. I think that’s the only way it’s going to work is if we’re both open to each other, and if there’s a need, let’s fill it.”

The districts plan to have a joint “town hall meeting” open to the community sometime this month to explain how the districts got started with collaboration, what they’ve done so far and opportunities they are considering for the future. No date has been announced as of this writing.

The next Greenwood and Loyal joint school board committee meeting is planned for June 22 at noon at Loyal High School.