It’s a historic move in sports as Girls Flag Football comes to Illinois high schools. The Illinois High School Association (IHSA) has confirmed that the game will debut in fall 2024, with a state champ being crowned. The IHSA praised Chicago Public Schools Athletic Administration and Chicago Bears for their grassroots efforts in promoting the sport. With over 100 schools already signed up to take part in the inaugural 2024 series, this game-changing initiative is sure to continue the rapid growth and popularity of girls flag football in the state of Illinois and beyond. It’s a significant stride in the IHSA’s mission of creating diverse participation opportunities for high school students.
RegionalMediaNews.com reached out to Kewanee Athletic Director Tim Atwell regarding the IHSA addition of Girls Flag Football and whether or not Kewanee Athletics might consider adding the sport. We also asked Coach Atwell about the process for adding specific sports to the High School Athletics roster…
“At this point, no one to my knowledge has inquired about adding Flag Football” Said Atwell.
Coach Atwell then explained the typical process of decision making regarding adding new sports at Kewanee High School…
“First , each school is different in how they handle this process of adding sports and activities…..
For Kewanee, the school board decides what sports the school is going to offer. And what typically takes place is an individual or group will attend a school board meeting and ask that the board to consider adding the sport/activity that the group wants. If the board is interested in entertaining the idea of adding the sport/activity, it will direct the superintendent to provide them more information. That’s when the principal or athletic director will do some research to provide more information to the superintendent and the school board.
I tried to quickly come up with a few things that might be considered:
-The season the sport is going to be offered.
-How many students are interested in participating?
-Cost-coaches pay, equipment, uniforms, transportation, facility use.
– Impact on other sports/activities if this is added to your list of sport offerings? Kewanee currently only allows athletes to do 1 sport per season. Some schools do allow athletes to do multiple sports in the same season.
-Do we have enough facilities to handle adding this sport/ activities…..Example…so in the case of adding Girls Flag football, we currently have Boys Varsity Football, FS Football, Jr High Football & Elementary Football and Varsity Soccer and JV Soccer …all require the use of the Game Field and Practice Fields. So , adding another sport to the mix that requires the use of these fields, one question to ask is can everyone be accommodated for practices and games with the current facilities that are in place?
– The last item that I thought of is Title 9. When adding a sport/activity the administration has to be sure it will not be in violation of Title 9. In the case of adding Girls Flag Football, the Title 9 issues do not come into play. But if the sport was a Boys Sport that was being added, then the administration would need to make sure they were in compliance with the law.
So when someone comes in asking to add a sport/activity, everyone needs to understand there are a lot of variables that have to be considered. Each request is different, some requests move faster than others depending on how many variables have to be considered.
