1997-11-04-sr-p22-reardan-pushed-to-1a

November 04, 1997 Spokesman-Review Page 22:

Morning Review

Reardan forced into 1A ranks

Enrollment report mistake causes reclassification for winter sports

Dave Trimmer Staff writer

The future is now for the Reardan Indians.

Students at Reardan, traditionally a Class B athletic power, were informed Monday they would be moving to 1A at the start of the winter sports season.

The decision was made Friday by the Washington Interscholastic Activities Association executive board after Reardan reported a mistake in its enrollment count last fall.

“Reardan has a very rich tradition of athletics. It’s going to be very difficult when they throw up the ball at the State B basketball tournament and we're not there,” first-year superintendent Rob Clark said Monday night, confirming the move. “It happened sooner than we expected, but it was inevitable.”

The shock was that it happened during the school year.

The Indians will leave the Bi-County League and enter the Northeast A League.

Reardan’s average enrollment last fall was about one student below the 151 which would have sent the Indians to 1A for this year and next.

“I saw our numbers in grades 10-12 are 165 without home school, we’re going to be an A school here pretty quick,” Clark said. “I wanted to make sure our home school numbers are right so I went into the database and we have five kids that should have been counted last year. I had to turn them in.”

The irony is that the WIAA audited the numbers last spring because they were so close to the cutoff and didn’t discover the five home school students.

“I’m not sure (why they were missed), but they were there,” Clark said. “Not being here last year, I don’t know why the were missed. On the flip side, the WIAA came in last year and they were missed. There were two mistakes, one on our part and one on their part. Two wrongs don’t make a right.”

Mike Colbrese, WIAA executive director, said, “Apparently we didn’t look deep enough is all I can say.”

An independent investigator conducted the audit.

Clark asked the executive board to make the adjustment at the beginning of the next school year.

“When you make a mistake you put yourself at the mercy of the executive board,” Clark said. “I’m not defending the mistakes, we have to own up to our mistakes. They could have penalized us for fall sports. I’m trying to look at it as if I’m on the other side of the table but I’m too close to make an unbiased assessment. I asked the executive board and they chose what they chose and I’m not going to complain.”

Colbrese said a number of different scenarios were discussed, but the bottom line was that Reardan had 1A numbers and to be fair to Class B schools, the Indians should be 1A.

“I think there’s a little bit of shock right now,” Clark said. “I don’t think it’s set in. I don’t think it will set in until the first couple of basketball games when we play Kettle (Falls) or Colfax (1A schools). “We have to go on and view it as a challenge. I think we can go on and be as competitive at the A level as we are at B. There may not be as many trips to state but there’s more to athletics than trips to state.”

The top-ranked Reardan football team and the volleyball team are not directly affected by the decision.