The Maine Principals Association’s rules on home-schoolers may need some tinkering, but that doesn’t mean they’re wrong. The intent – to keep abuses out of Maine high school athletics – is important to the quality and fairness of play for all state athletes.

MPA rules prohibit home-schooled athletes from choosing to play for a private school. They must play for their local public school or not play at all.

Home-schooled students see this as an infringement of their right of choice.

But consider if there weren’t some limitations on where they could play: Five talented basketball-playing, home-schooled students might all choose to play for a centrally located, private high school. It might be an innocent choice times five, but it wouldn’t seem that way. All of the public-school teams losing to this “super team” would claim that the home-school student athletes had been recruited or had colluded to band together.

Even the addition of one talented player from the home-schooled pool would be a tempting addition for a private-school coach. Yes, the MPA has rules against recruitment, but proving recruitment on a player-by-player basis is another thing. There are 4,400 home-schooled students in Maine, each one a potential recruitment violation if an athlete opts for any school athletic program other than the one at the local public school.

The super team is only one concern.

Consider student-athletes in the public school system who struggle academically and whose grades might keep them off the team or on the bench. By becoming home-schoolers, then opting for a private school sports team, they could do an end run around academic rules.

These are hypothetical situations and may seem unlikely, but they aren’t unknown in the cavalcade of high school sports. The MPA rules are in place because teams and athletes are known to seek any advantage within the rules to win. Strong rules keep the playing field level. That’s important to the tens of thousands of Maine public and private school student-athletes who play by those rules.

The decision will not end with the recent MPA reminder to schools about the rule. The Homeschool Legal Defense Association has promised a lawsuit, saying the MPA has “violated state law, ignored its own rules and violated home-schoolers’ federal constitutional rights.” Meanwhile, Maine Rep. Theodore Heidrich, R-Oxford, has proposed legislation to end the MPA ban.

Whatever emerges, Maine needs safeguards to assure everyone who coaches and plays that fairness triumphs. The intent of the MPA rule must remain intact.


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