Public Vs. Private: Finding a Way to Win

Public vs. Private Schools, the controversy that is always shown under the lights, across America every night. Two teams line up to play, but one has an advantage over the other. One has the ability to recruit, and to control the sports in their area. These are the private schools, which are the “king of the hill” in high school sports.

The public schools, as hard as they try, attempt to dethrone these kings. However, many of these attempts are futile however, due to the unnatural balance between the two teams. Most teams are just doomed from the start, as they attempt to see the vast number of the private school. Like an army, their vast numbers file out of charter buses.

Bill Paterson of the
Sacramento Bee
says, “…Private School’s having an advantage with recruiting players for there school, their program getting private funding, which allows and gives them the best coaches, sports venue’s, travel expenses, uniforms, and education?” However, if we try to segregate these schools into their own “division”, or attempt to get them to play their own kind of school, these private schools would rise in protest, that
they
are being treated unfairly in the situation, when the public schools have gotten that stick long before them.

The major key to the private school is recruiting. If the home school that the athlete goes to would have some support for most of the coaching staff and players, then maybe less and less of players outside of the school system would transfer in to play sports. There also has to be reasons for the athlete to want to leave so quickly from his current school. Most young high school athletes are lead to these big schools, and lead away from there home school just because they don’t have a name like “Trinity” or “Saint Xavier.”

But, we must also remember that even if they are proven to be better than their public school adversary, it may not be only due to the fact that they are a private school. There are many factors that may prove them to be the better team, more than just what kind of school they are. They have all of the advantage’s that make them some of the best schools in the state or area they are in. The advantage is almost irreplaceable.

There have been many people that have had many different theories on how to erase the differential between private schools and public schools. The Ohio State Athletic Association has developed a computer ranking system that factors in a large amount of things . This ranking system gives out a number for the team, and then they organize the number, and they have there rankings. Another theory that has been thought about is that they organize all of the private schools into their own league, and have the public schools in their own league. That way, every team has the opportunity to play teams that are just as good as them, and all of the teams are on an equal playing field.

Many schools that have somewhat of a good team are starting to get their footing into the world of high school sports have been crushed by the mighty “Trinity’s and the “Saint X’s” of the respective areas. But from all of these crushing losses, there are many good stories. For example, here in our own state, one team from Bourbon County started the season a measly 0-5. But then, they turned it around finishing the season 6-5 and finishing 3rd in the district. They then won the district, the region, and went to state. Then, there was one great obstacle in the way. The great beast that is Trinity. They defeated them, the private school, to seal “one of the greatest come backs of all time.” Out of all of the unfairness and other things that go on, if we didn’t have our “Trinity’s” and our “Saint X’s”, what would we aim to beat? If we didn’t have the teams that have all of the advantages, like recruiting, the best coaches, players, teams, and all of the other things? If we lacked these teams, then who would be the king of the hill we would wish to topple? I can answer that for you. There wouldn’t be one. The private school is the element of the of High School football that cannot be erased. It is one of the facts of life, that there are always going to be private schools looming over us like a dark cloud. The only thing that the public schools can do is just get better.