#RespectTheRivalry.
Expect to see this message on social media in the fall after the ban imposed in March on student attendance at athletic contests between rivals Los Gatos and Palo Alto is lifted.
Delegations from both high schools, including more than 20 students, met Monday at Fremont High in Sunnyvale for a “Positive Sportsmanship Summit” that lasted a little over two hours with the goal to improve a climate that turned toxic over time.
“It was mostly the kids doing work on their own in groups trying to brainstorm some ideas of, ‘What kind of messages do we want to send to our peers out there and what is the appropriate behavior that we need to have at our contests?’ ” Central Coast Section commissioner Duane Morgan said.
“It was really cool event to be a part of and to see these young men and women from both schools come together and really work with one another and start to address these questions,” Los Gatos athletic director Ken Perrotti said. “I was blown away with just the responses that the kids were coming up with, the level of discussion, their honesty and openness about the situation.”
A myriad of student-athletes took part in the summit.
Los Gatos sent a contingent that included football, basketball, baseball, softball, field hockey, swimming and dance. Palo Alto was represented by badminton, baseball, basketball, golf, lacrosse, soccer, water polo and wrestling.
Others who don’t sport an uniform were also invited to attend, including members from the student board.
“We tried to get as far and wide of a sample size without getting too many kids involved,” Perrotti said. “We really wanted to seek kids who are influencers in a positive way, so these are natural leaders not just from sports.”
“It was a real positive environment in the room,” Palo Alto athletic director Therren Wilburn said. “I think both student bodies worked well together and collaborated and have good ideas moving forward. This is the first piece of our solution, so it’s not the final piece.”
After a presentation from Positive Coaching Alliance that addressed the impact of social media and a message from the CCS commissioner, students broke into groups in search of ways to move forward, rather than point fingers.
“Everybody wants to go to football games, everybody wants to go to basketball games, so they want to get this thing righted and move on,” Morgan said. “The kids were looking for solutions, not dwelling on the problems. They want to hear messages that resonate with the high school kids.”
To that end, the students came up with a template for a message of sportsmanship and respect to be shared with fans in the stands prior to the heated rivalry contests.
“We’ve seen that in other events that we hold,” Morgan said. “When kids talk at those events, the crowd gets very quiet and that’s a very powerful message.”
Perrotti and Wilburn held conversations about the summit at the beginning of April during the California State Athletic Directors Association meeting in San Diego, then met again at a Starbucks to draft an agenda and narrative for the students to follow.
But the administrators feel that they can only control so much of this narrative.
“We did spend a considerable amount of time surveying what we wanted to get out of this entire process, but the No. 1 thing that we kept circling back to is that this really has to be student driven, it has to come from our kids,” Perrotti said. “At the end of the day, the kids are going to listen to their peers. And, so, for this to have any kind of lasting effect it was really important to us that the kids have buy-in from the get-go and they understand that this is coming from the students, this isn’t coming from the adults.”
The plan is for the majority of these students to meet again in September in order to reestablish communication and continue implementation of a joint sportsmanship script that is still being ironed out.
“They’re going to stay on it and they’ve going to hold everybody accountable, which is good,” Morgan said. “And the kids are even going to hold themselves accountable, which is even better.”
HIGH SCHOOL SPORTS? WE’VE GOT YOU COVERED
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