Sunday, June 22, 2014

Contact Days? Or Football Camp?

Ahhhh...summer.  That time of year.  The birds are singing, the bees are stinging, and it's time to start thinking about SPHS's traditional football "Gridiron Camp".
Wait...there is no Gridiron Camp....at least if you check Sun Prairie sites.
But a funny thing happens when you expand your web search to, say, Waunakee.  Suddenly you find that there IS a Gridiron camp this year!
And it's held on Sun Prairie fields (as usual)....but no mention of Sun Prairie.
Are they just renting our fields to ear them up instead of their own?
We don't think so!

You see...if you apply a little elbow grease to the old mouse, you see that Sun Prairie varsity football coach Brian Kaminski has reserved two fields for the same dates (July 21-24, 2014) as Waunakee's Gridiron Camp (t SPHS) for "Contact Days".

Now we know that under the revised policy KG (Field and Facility Use), one is exempt from paying for field use if one is using facilities for "Contact Days".  But of course, to do so, there can be no charges to student athletes...right?

Sneaky Petes!
Is it football contact days for Sun Prairie:
Or it is a football camp with cloaking device activated?
It takes some doing, but if one checks out the "Waunakeefootball.org" website (Waunakee's football boosters), one finds:


What we find interesting is that if you compare the flyers from previous years to this year, one critical things has been removed:  the location!


Fundraiser?
The cost for the camp is $65 per student ($70 after June 1, so any "push" for this occurred during the school year)...and that gets you a t-shirt.
All money is sent to a Waunakee address which happens to be that of the Waunakee coach.
The fee angle raises a bunch of questions:

  • Why wouldn't the money be sent to the booster club (Waunakeefootball.org)?
  • Why isn't there a reservation under Waunakee's name?
  • Are Sun Prairie kids part of this?
  • Do they have to pay too?  Because that would make this a fundraiser and not "contact days...right?
  • If they  don't have to pay, since these are *free* contact days, do they still get a t-shirt?
  • What will we think if/when every kid on the field is wearing a Gridiron Camp t-shirt?
  • Did/Do SPHS kids have to pay on the down low?
  • Is Waunakee being billed for field use? It doesn't look that way, since Coach Kaminski--and not Waunakee Football--is the "client"?  
  • Is anyone being billed?  How much?  The camp says 9-12 for 4 days (12 hrs) but the two fields are  reserved 8:30-12.  Will the cost be for 12 hrs?  or 1?
  • Is anyone paying to have the fields striped?

Why the subterfuge?
let's be clear about what we are doing...and hold others accountable to the same.

Right now we don't know what they are doing.

Oh, so VERY many questions!!!
We expect answers...so we hope someone in the district is monitoring all this.