Arkansas' high school athletic competition will undergo vast changes beginning with the 2018-2019 school year.
Proposal 9 voted on during Arkansas Activities Association's annual meeting of the governing body at Monday's meeting at Little Rock, now restructures classes in virtually every sport except football.
In short, Proposal 9 creates new leagues with new teams and changes conference alignments beginning with the 2018-19 school year.
The proposal calls for the elimination of one class (7A) in basketball, baseball, softball and tennis and track. Class 6A will consist of the state's 16 largest high schools, which are currently in Class 7A. Beyond that, current classficiations will be revamped.
The next 32 schools go Class 5A, then the next 48 schools Class 4A. The remaining schools will be split into three parts and will be in either Class 3A, Class 2A or Class 1A, with any leftover schools being considered Class 1A schools.
Proposal 9 eliminates blended conferences, such as the 6A/5A District 1, that pitted Farmington against 6A schools Greenwood, Russellville and Siloam Springs lumped in with 5A West members Alma, Clarksville and Harrison. There will be no more 4A/3A leagues for Prairie Grove and Lincoln against the likes of Elkins, Greenland and Haas Hall.
According to the AAA, blended conferences cut travel for about 92 percent of the state's schools, reducing expenditures, and leading to closer games that generated increased gates. The problem was seeding teams for district tournaments. Some conference members never played each other during the regular season.
Proposal 9 didn't include football, because football games are played mainly on Friday nights. Those athletes aren't missing as much classroom time as those in sports competing multiple times during the week.
The new changes in classification mandate sports such as wrestling and swimming add a classification by going Class 6A, Class 5A and Class 4A and below, but none of the local schools compete in either. Cross country will have five divisions instead of the six for 2017-2018. Soccer and volleyball remain with four classifications -- Class 6A, Class 5A, Class 4A and Class 3A and below.
Proposal 9 changed the AAA handbook, thus requiring a two-thirds of the vote from participating schools in order to pass.
According to AAA rules, written ballots are given to each voting representative upon signing in at the meeting. Voting power rests with the superintendent, who may authorize in writing an assistant/deputy superintendent, or principal or assistant principal as the voting representative for each member school. The rules stipulate an individual shall represent only one school.
Proposal 9 was submitted by Clarksville High School. Proposal 9 received a "do-pass recommendation" by the AAA Board of Directors.
Sports on 08/02/2017