A state lawmaker in New Jersey wants to curtail reclassification in youth sports.
State Sen. Anthony Bucco (R-Morris) introduced a bill that aims to force the state’s governing body for high school sports to penalize students who repeat a middle-school grade for athletic advantage.
S4545 calls for any athlete who is held back in Grades 6-8 despite meeting the requirements to progress to only have six semesters of eligibility — effectively making them ineligible as high school seniors. The bill would not impact students who are held back for academic or developmental reasons.
The bill’s mechanism is interesting.
The NJSIAA’s current policy says seniors are eligible as long as they are still 18 on Sept. 1 of that school year.
The legislation would not directly change the rule, but instead legally prevents public school districts from being a member of "any voluntary association which oversees activities associated with statewide interscholastic sports programs” that does not adopt the bill’s outlined eligibility standards.
Legislators in my home state love to get involved in high school sports, especially when there is a buzzy topic that has gotten media attention, a chance to sling some arrows at the often-beleaguered NJSIAA and — which I suspect here — an angle to score one for the public schools.
This bill would strong-arm the NJSIAA into adopting a policy to keep public schools (the vast majority of its membership) in the fold. But the private schools are a) where reclassification has been most prominent and b) the natural landing spots for most families who would consider reclassification in the first place.
This bill would strike a major blow to reclassification in the Garden State if it passes.
It could also spur the private schools to break away from the NJSIAA — which would likely be welcome in some corners of the state, including in Trenton’s legislative chambers.
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