Page 8 THE VILLADOM TIMES IV • April 11, 2012
Mahwah
Trustees consider athletics for home-schooled students
by Frank J. McMahon
The Mahwah Board of Education is considering whether to permit home-schooled students to participate in the district’s interscholastic athletic programs. Policy Committee Chairman Douglas D’Angelo provided trustees with two alternate proposals at the board’s last public meeting ,and the board introduced Policy 2431 regarding athletic completion in the district. That policy, if adopted at the board’s next meeting, would adopt the rules and regulations of the New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association and require the district to prepare rules for the conduct of pupils participating in interscholastic athletics that conform to the State Board of Education, the NJSIAA, and the Northwest Bergen Interscholastic Athletic League. Interim Superintendent Karen Lake pointed out to the board that the biggest problem in approving the participation of home-schooled students in interscholastic athletic competition is the criteria required in academics. She explained that it could be difficult for the district to determine if a home-schooled student is being held to the same academic standards as students in the district schools. Lake also pointed out that the board’s policy would apply specifically to athletics.
Roger Pelletier, the high school’s director of athletics, provided Lake and Mahwah High School Principal John Pascale indicated that 23 school districts do not permit home-schooled students to participate in district athletic competition, while seven do. In the local area, the Northern Highlands, Ramsey, Northern Valley Demarest, Northern Valley Old Tappan, Pascack Valley, Pascack Hills, and West Milford school districts do not permit home-schooled students to participate in interscholastic athletic competition while Midland Park, Lakeland Regional, and Ramapo do. The board is reacting to the New Jersey Department of Education policy, which permits a board of education to allow a child educated somewhere other than at school to participate in curricular and extracurricular activities or sports. The board is also addressing a 2011 change in the NJSIAA bylaws that resulted from a 2011 case in Midland Park. At Midland Park’s urging and the intervention of the New Jersey Department of Education, the NJSIAA Executive Committee reversed its policy and will now permit children schooled at home to participate in interscholastic sports provided that both the school and the home-schooled student comply with newly-adopted NJSIAA guidelines. The Midland Park case involved Ray and Maureen
Borzone, who sought the board’s help in getting the NJSIAA ban changed on behalf of their son, Zak, who is home-schooled. Those guidelines include an approval by a board of education and the requirement that a student meet the residency requirements of the school district, a written request by the parent of a home-schooled student to the principal of the school to allow the student to try out for an athletic team, and compliance of the home-schooled student with the same physical examination, insurance, age, academic, and other requirements for participation as is required for all students at the high school. NJSIAA guidelines also require that the homeschooled student meet all eligibility requirements of the NJSIAA and demonstrate to the satisfaction of local school officials that the student is academically qualified to participate and will be subject to the rules and decisions of the NJSIAA. Any student who withdraws from a public school program to enroll in a home-school program and is ineligible at the time of withdrawal due to a failure to meet academic, behavioral, or eligibility standards, will be ineligible to compete in interscholastic athletics in the same manner as a student who has transferred from one school to another for athletic advantage.